This module focuses on storage system configuration and management of SP management

ports and Multicore Cache setting verification.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 1
 This lesson covers the configuration of VNX management ports.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 2
 Unisphere provides graphical depictions of all VNX components as well as the other
features. Selecting a section button (System in the example) displays a big button page
that contains buttons to select subsections. These items are exactly the same as those in
the top level of the drop-down menu when hovering over the section button. The big button
pages also include a task list. This task list is the same as the task list shown on content
pages.
The type of screen that will be displayed depends on if the system is a Block only system, a
File only system, or a Unified system. For example the slide shows a VNX Unified view.
Hardware views relate logical objects to physical components. System configuration and
state information is tracked in real time although the LEDs are not real time.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 3
 Selecting the Storage Hardware button will bring users to the “Hardware” page.
Components will be displayed and can be expanded from the tree structure to show
subcomponents. Right-clicking on an SP launches the “SP Properties window” from this
window select the “Network” tab. This tab allows users to view and modify the physical
network port properties and provides access to the “Virtual Port” Properties window.
Double-click on the “Virtual Port” to configure the IP address for the port.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 4
 Network settings can also be configured from the “Settings” menu option and selecting
“Edit Networks Settings – SPx” This will launch the same “SP Properties’ window and allow
users to access the “Virtual Port Properties” window.
There are two network troubleshooting commands that can be executed from the window,
Ping and Traceroute.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 5
 This lesson covers VNX Multicore Cache benefits and settings.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 6
 Multicore Cache, also known as SP Cache, is an MCx software component that optimizes
host write and read performance by optimizing a VNX storage processors DRAM. Multicore
Cache was designed to effectively scale across multiple CPU cores.
Multicore Cache space is shared for writes and reads. A dirty (used) cache page is copied to
disk, and the data remains in memory.
As you can see in the figure, cache is shared between writes (1) and reads (2), then copied
to disk (3). This way the page can be re-hit again by the host (4 and 5), improving
performance. Data is ultimately expelled from cache (7), freeing the page for other
workloads.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 7
 Multicore Cache Dynamic Watermarks constantly evaluates the effectiveness of cache for
specific workloads. Buffering write I/Os in cache is effective for short bursts, but that write
buffering is also counterproductive for workloads that tend to occupy the entire cache
space. The rate of flushing, and the rate of acceptance of host I/O into cache, is managed
dynamically to optimize system performance.
Multicore Cache Write Throttling dynamically auto-adjusts incoming and outgoing I/O per
RAID group. Multicore Cache provides the destination RAID group with time needed to
process an increased flushing load by delaying host I/O acknowledgements, thus slowing
the rate of incoming writes. Throttling continues until the rate of incoming data is equated
with the abilities of the underlying RAID group and the pre-cleaning age value changed to
match the workload.
When the RAID group’s rate of page flushing levels with the rate of incoming I/O, and the
associated dirty pages stay in cache for equal or less time than the pre-cleaning age value
regulates, write throttling stops.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 8
 Write through mode simply disables cache, so that writes are written through cache directly
to disk. There’s no write acknowledgement to the host until the write has been completed
to the spindle.
Since disabling Write Cache causes I/O to be written directly to disk, there will be a
significantly negative impact on performance. It is recommended that the default setting of
“Enabled” remain in place. If changing this setting is being considered, it is strongly
recommended that this default setting only be changed at the direction of EMC Engineering personnel.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 9
 This module covered the administration of the VNX SP management ports. VNX Multicore
Cache was described, as well as verifying its settings.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 10
 This Lab covers the VNX system configuration. Since the lab systems are preconfigured, this
lab exercise covers the verification of the system configuration. It verifies the configuration
settings for the Storage Processor (SP) cache and the SP networking configuration. The
exercise also explores the VNX system hardware and port configuration as well as its iSCSI
ports configuration.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 11
 This lab covered VNX storage processor configurations – cache settings, networking, and
port configuration.

Copyright 2015 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. Module: Storage System Configuration 12