How to add or remove storage to your Data Domain Virtual Edition (DDVE)

To add data disks, open the VM settings panel in the hypervisor and select "Add a New Hard Disk" under the "New Devices" tab. Set the size accordingly, remembering that the first data disk must be a minimum size of 200 GB and subsequent disks must be 100 GB or more.

DDVE supports only thick provisioning for the production system.

If the box is not checked, the system could encounter an issue where the DDVE will not boot due to a requirement to run a file system consistency check against the root partitions.

Once storage is added to the hypervisor, move onto the DDVE itself.

Below is an example of adding the capacity to the wanted tier and then creating or expanding the DDVE file system.

From the CLI (UI is also available to add storage), run the command storage show all. This shows the addable storage presented to the DDVE. In this case, 100 GiB is presented, and it is seen as Device 8:

# storage show all
Device        Device   Device
Group                  Size
-----------   ------   ---------
dg0           7        250.0 GiB
-----------   ------   ---------

Spindle   Devices   Count   Total Size
Group
-------   -------   -----   ----------
1         7         1       250.0 GiB
-------   -------   -----   ----------

Current active tier size: 0.2 TiB
Active tier maximum capacity: 0.5 TiB



Storage addable devices:
Device        Device   Device
Type                   Size
-----------   ------   ---------
(unknown)     8        100.0 GiB
-----------   ------   ---------

Capacity License:
License    Total      Used       Remaining
--------   --------   --------   ---------
CAPACITY   0.45 TiB   0.22 TiB   0.23 TiB
--------   --------   --------   ---------

Then to add the storage to the DDVE active tier, use the command storage add dev8:

# storage add dev8

Checking storage requirements...done
Adding dev8 to the active tier...done

Updating system information...done

dev8 successfully added to the active tier.

Now when storage show all is run again, we see the 100 GiB disk has moved from being addable to available within the active tier:

# storage show all
Device        Device   Device
Group                  Size
-----------   ------   ---------
dg0           7        250.0 GiB
(available)   8        100.0 GiB
-----------   ------   ---------

Spindle   Devices   Count   Total Size
Group
-------   -------   -----   ----------
1         7-8       2       350.0 GiB
-------   -------   -----   ----------

Current active tier size: 0.3 TiB
Active tier maximum capacity: 0.5 TiB




Capacity License:
License    Total      Used       Remaining
--------   --------   --------   ---------
CAPACITY   0.45 TiB   0.31 TiB   0.15 TiB
--------   --------   --------   ---------

Finally, to add the capacity to the file system, run the command filesys expand, which increases the size of the file system.

# filesys expand
The filesystem will be expanded approximately by 95.85 GiB
        Are you sure? (yes|no) [no]: yes

ok, proceeding.

########################################### [100%]
The approximate size of the filesystem is 318.91 GiB.

Then check the file system status. If it is not online, bring it up with the command filesys enable.

# filesys status
The filesystem is enabled and running.

Example: If the command disk show hardware shows that the number of disks is 15 and the DDVE is deployed on vSphere, more disks cannot be added with only one SCSI HBA controller.

# disk show hardware
Disk    Slot        Manufacturer/Model         Firmware   Serial No.                         Capacity    Type
        (pci/idx)
-----   ---------   ------------------------   --------   --------------------------------   ---------   ----
dev1    160:0       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c2901098e892c4f75673f4a2d03e   250.0 GiB   SAS
dev2    160:1       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29508c5f8f603adc20a782d5d28   10.0 GiB    SAS
dev3    160:2       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29db79d7c6d15f1984bcbf3ca0e   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev4    160:3       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c2921955ebff06a8bbab1f272b58   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev5    160:4       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29214fbca7889f3b8fb6783a353   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev6    160:5       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29ea52fa7d358efc83360327910   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev7    160:6       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29a831a62ab2476e9f49cebc374   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev8    160:9       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29dfa0799767087895ec6acf185   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev9    160:8       VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c2934323889384e55f0cd335ff12   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev10   160:10      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c2940a958c575258fdc156e8a0ea   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev11   160:11      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c291018aa8771b1eaa1444003c9a   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev12   160:12      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29cc49b7941cc5e1d4e58b62208   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev13   160:13      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c290792e874885af90681d0b54e5   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev14   160:14      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c297ff85ec1e03f74d6fe3a3a4d8   4.0 TiB     SAS
dev15   160:15      VMware  Virtual_disk       n/a        6000c29541f230cebe060b3ac13796f2   4.0 TiB     SAS
-----   ---------   ------------------------   --------   --------------------------------   ---------   ----
15 drives present.

Check the number of SCSI HBA controllers by running the command system show ports:

# system show ports
Port   Connection   Link        Firmware   Hardware
       Type         Speed                  Address
----   ----------   ---------   --------   -------------------------
V0     Enet         10.0 Gbps              00:50:56:b8:b1:c1 (ethV0)
V1     Enet         10.0 Gbps              00:50:56:b8:70:92 (ethV1)
V2     SAS          >>> one SCSI Controller
----   ----------   ---------   --------   -------------------------

The process goes as follows:

1. First, the power off the DDVE
2. From the vSphere, add an additional SCSI controller to the DDVE and make sure that the newly added SCSI Controller has the same configuration as the existing one.
   • Example: If SCSI controller 0 has a type of "VMware Paravirtual," make the new controller type the same.
3. Power on the DDVE. Running the command system show ports shows that a new controller is added, so now more than 15 disks can be added for vSphere by assigning them to controller 1 instead of 0:

# system show ports
Port   Connection   Link        Firmware   Hardware
       Type         Speed                  Address
----   ----------   ---------   --------   -------------------------
V0     Enet         10.0 Gbps              00:50:56:b8:b1:c1 (ethV0)
V1     Enet         10.0 Gbps              00:50:56:b8:70:92 (ethV1)
V2     SAS
V3     SAS
----   ----------   ---------   --------   -------------------------

Removal of disks from a DDVE

Generally disks should not be removed from the DDVE or hypervisor, because once the disks have been added and the file system expanded over them, they cannot be removed without destroying the file system. In case an incorrectly-sized disk is accidentally served up to the DDVE within the hypervisor and the file system has not been expanded over it, you can remove it from the hypervisor and re-create the correct size disk.

For example, if you create a new disk below the required size in the hypervisor and then attempt to add it to the DDVE, you receive an error on the DDVE. So you must remove the disk from the DDVE and hypervisor and start again.

As seen above, the disk is only 25 GB. Attempt to add it to the DDVE results in an error.

# storage add dev4
Checking storage requirements...
**** Could not add storage: disk capacity is below the minimum limit 100 GB.

Since the file system has not been expanded over the disk, it can be removed and deleted from the hypervisor.

Click the "Remove" button.

Things to note when removing a disk:

1. Never remove an in-use disk once the file system has been expanded over it.
2. Only remove disks that show to be unknown since installation time or available/addable.
3. Remember to remove and delete from the hypervisor if the disk is no longer required.
4. The NVRAM disk can be removed and re-created. Ensure it has the same SCSI address it had before.
5. If a disk was removed from the hypervisor and it still shows as absent on the DDVE, reboot the DDVE.
6. If a disk was removed in error and the DDVE file system no longer works, contact your support provider for further help.