Dell OpenManage Integration with Microsoft Windows Admin Center Version 3.0 User’s Guide

View recommendations for storage expansion

Using the OpenManage Integration extension, you can view recommendations that enables you to prepare nodes for expanding the Azure Stack HCI cluster storage.

1. In Windows Admin Center, connect to an Azure Stack HCI cluster and launch Dell OpenManage Integration.
2. Click View > Expand Cluster. A new menu appears with dropdowns. Select Add Storage. Alternatively, click Actions > Expand Cluster > Add Storage.
3. If the cluster meets the "prerequisites" mentioned above, OpenManage Integration extension validates the storage configuration of cluster nodes against the HCP policies (Dell Hardware Symmetry Policy rules) and displays the cluster-level status and drives details for each cluster node. View node level storage configuration details.
4. Click the Expand Storage button if enabled. The Storage Expansion Summary pane appears on the right.
   If the Expand Storage button is disabled, ensure the following:

   • The cluster may not fulfill all the prerequisites. See the banner message and ensure that all the prerequisites mentioned are met, and then refresh the cluster inventory and start from step 1.
   • The cluster may be non-compliant if the cluster storage configuration does not comply with all the critical Dell Hardware Symmetry Policy rules. In this case, click the HCP Compliance tab and ensure that the cluster is compliant. If the cluster is non-compliance, perform the remediations and then try again. To learn more about storage and disks specific rules, see HCI configuration profile.
5. In the Storage Expansion Summary wizard, review the following information about the cluster storage configuration:
   • Cluster name
   • Node counts
   • Available slot count where storage expansion is possible in the cluster. The available slots show a warning if any cluster nodes have SAS/SATA drives because, currently, exact number of the empty slots for drives with media types such as HDD and SDD may not be retrieved.
     NOTE: The available empty slots are calculated using the total available slots and total connected drives. Therefore, the available empty slots may not match the number of empty slots for the HDD and SSD. This is because these drives are embedded in the server chassis.
   • Used storage
   • Available storage
6. If the cluster is non-compliant with a warning, follow the recommendations to ensure the cluster storage is symmetric. The Recommendation section includes the following details:
   • The Dell HCP policy rule that your cluster does not comply.
   • The drive details that must be added or replaced to make your cluster compliant.
   After the cluster is compliant (cluster storage is symmetric), go to step 1 and follow the instructions to see storage expansion recommendations.
7. If the cluster is compliant, choose one of the following storage expansion options, specify the storage size, and then click Refresh Recommendation to see the storage expanding recommendations.
   • Increase overall capacity: Overall capacity indicates the sum of all the disk storage capacity in a cluster. Specify the storage size as available to increase the overall capacity of the cluster.
   • Increase usable capacity: Usable capacity indicates the actual storage size that is used by the cluster after reserving some storage for fault tolerance (resiliency). Specify the overall usable capacity as available for the entire cluster.
     NOTE: As the usable capacity is a fraction of the overall capacity, when the user input selection is increased to the maximum and then reduced, the user input selection may become irrelevant with the overall cluster disk size. In this case, reduce the usable capacity to zero and start again.
   OpenManage Integration displays overall capacity based on resiliency type. See the Microsoft document for more information about fault tolerance and storage efficiency on HCI clusters.

   The Recommendation section displays the following details:

   • STORAGE: Displays node name. Also, displays the number of drives that are required with recommended media type, and the recommended storage capacity of each drive.
   • Supported models
     NOTE: "AGN MU" in the model description indicates that the model is vendor agnostic and mixed use.
   • Manufacturer
   • Endurance
   • Actual Capacity
   • Bus Protocol
   • Cache to capacity ratio (only available for hybrid nodes).

   NOTE:

   • Recommendations are derived based on possible empty slots present in the nodes. For nonuniform media types across the cluster, you may see some warnings even after following the recommendation.
   • Usable capacity that is recommended in dual-parity mode is a nearest match and may not match with the exact usable capacity that is entered by the user.
   • To order drives, Dell Technologies recommends using the bus protocol, model, size mentioned in the storage column, and endurance information to identify compatible drives for storage expansion.