Hello,
I would like to know the IBM best practice on the following infrastructure upgrade :
We have 6 node SVC stretched cluster (2145 - SV1) between two sites (20km distance).
We want to replace SVC with two new FS9500 (one for each site).

What is the best possible way to refresh/replace the SVC ?
I did SVC to SVC HW refresh by non-disruptive node replacement , but I suppose this will not be the case for FS9500.
Any Idea how to do it?
Thanks
Soba

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Somesekhar Banerjee
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#Storage
#StorageAreaNetworks
#PrimaryStorage

No, you cannot use non-disruptive node replacement procedure with 9500. Are you familiar with "export to image mode" migration? 
and what is the host os?

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Nezih Boyacioglu
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Sounds to me that this will be a move from SVC Stretched cluster to Hyperswap config between 2 FS9500 (Stretched cluster topology only exists on SVC).

A year ago, I wanted to do a similar migration going from SVC Stretched Cluster (in my case only 4 nodes)  to Hyperswap between 2 FS7200.

Although that even today I am still convinced that this would be a good approach, I received a lot of pushback from IBM because they literally told me several times that they could not guarantee same performance without the SVC and if performance issues would occur, it would be at own risk.
Only for that reason (valid or not), our management decided to put in place a stretched SVC cluster with 1 FS7200 backend storage at each site.

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Hans Populaire
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Independent from my previous comment (which is still valid), you may be able to do a non-disruptive migration to another Spectrum Virtualize based solution ;
Release notes op 8.4.2 contains the following "new feature" :

Nondisruptive volume migration between systems allows migration of volumes from one IBM Spectrum Virtualize system to another for load balancing or upgrading hardware, without losing host access or requiring any application down time during the migration

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Hans Populaire
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The feature is called Volume Mobility and it will be quite useful with everyone retiring their SVC's  Here is a demo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpcOoshkm4w

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IBM-SAN Admin
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Original Message:
Sent: Thu July 14, 2022 05:14 AM
From: Hans Populaire
Subject: Replacing SVC with FS9500

Independent from my previous comment (which is still valid), you may be able to do a non-disruptive migration to another Spectrum Virtualize based solution ;
Release notes op 8.4.2 contains the following "new feature" :

Nondisruptive volume migration between systems allows migration of volumes from one IBM Spectrum Virtualize system to another for load balancing or upgrading hardware, without losing host access or requiring any application down time during the migration

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Hans Populaire
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Comment on the "Volume Mobility" feature (only available on 8.4.2 or 8.5.X) :
Not sure if it can be used in this particular use case :

We are not migrating from a standalone to a standalone system :

Instead this is a migration from (replicated, active/active) Stretched cluster to (replicated, active/active) Hyperswap.
Don't know if this is a supported scenario for "Volume Mobility".
To be checked with IBM I guess.

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Hans Populaire
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Volume mobility is not a solution for this migration.
Is it an option to build a hyperswap cluster (FS9500) next to the stretched cluster and do a host-based migration?
This can also be performed nondisruptively with multiple operating systems.

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T Masteen
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Original Message:
Sent: Tue July 19, 2022 07:50 AM
From: Hans Populaire
Subject: Replacing SVC with FS9500

Comment on the "Volume Mobility" feature (only available on 8.4.2 or 8.5.X) :
Not sure if it can be used in this particular use case :

We are not migrating from a standalone to a standalone system :

Instead this is a migration from (replicated, active/active) Stretched cluster to (replicated, active/active) Hyperswap.
Don't know if this is a supported scenario for "Volume Mobility".
To be checked with IBM I guess.

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Hans Populaire
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I fully agree on this comment :

This also means for me : today, several historical arguments to justify the usage/additional cost of SVC clusters have become obsolete for several reasons :

- the vast majority of OS allows you to do host based online storage migrations (source and target storage can be from different vendors)
- Most storage vendors have simplified/automated their storage management : introducing such a new storage is intuitive and does not require additional
    training/expertise

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Hans Populaire
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Original Message:
Sent: Wed July 20, 2022 03:22 AM
From: T Masteen
Subject: Replacing SVC with FS9500

Volume mobility is not a solution for this migration.
Is it an option to build a hyperswap cluster (FS9500) next to the stretched cluster and do a host-based migration?
This can also be performed nondisruptively with multiple operating systems.

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T Masteen
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Original Message:
Sent: Tue July 19, 2022 07:50 AM
From: Hans Populaire
Subject: Replacing SVC with FS9500

Comment on the "Volume Mobility" feature (only available on 8.4.2 or 8.5.X) :
Not sure if it can be used in this particular use case :

We are not migrating from a standalone to a standalone system :

Instead this is a migration from (replicated, active/active) Stretched cluster to (replicated, active/active) Hyperswap.
Don't know if this is a supported scenario for "Volume Mobility".
To be checked with IBM I guess.

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Hans Populaire