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How to move existing saved snapshots from 15k drives to 7.2k drives

rbauman79
2,626 Views

i have a 2240HA.  we have a 3 ds4243 with 7200 drives for cifs storage, and 1 ds4243 with 15k drives which is dedicated for our vmware vcenter environment.  Currently we use smvi to backup our vm's but they are currently being saved to the 15k drives.  How can i move my existing snapshots on flex volumes over to my 7200k drives to free up space that valuable space on my 15k drives?  Also is there a way to have all future snapshots be saved directly to the 7200rpm drives by reconfiguring my current smvi policies or will have to rebuild them? Finally, is there any downside to doing this that i should be aware of.  i have a feeling the backup/restore window maybe a little slower/longer.

i know i have briefly read about using ndmpcopy and vol copy but wasn't sure if that was the best way or if there is some other option that i am not aware of.

Thanks

3 REPLIES 3

ekashpureff
2,626 Views

rbauman -

You'd want to SnapVault the volumes to the SATA drives for longer term snapshot retention.

See the Data Protection Online Backup and Recovery Guide:

https://library.netapp.com/ecmdocs/ECMP1368826/html/frameset.html

I hope this response has been helpful to you.

At your service,

Eugene E. Kashpureff, Sr.

Independent NetApp Consultant, K&H Research http://www.linkedin.com/in/eugenekashpureff

Senior NetApp Instructor, IT Learning Solutions http://sg.itls.asia/netapp

(P.S. I appreciate points for helpful or correct answers.)

rbauman79
2,626 Views

Hi Eugene,

Thanks for the link.

So i use snapvault to move the data from 15k to 7200rpm drives? We have snapmirror licensing as well. Is there a reason to use snapvault over snapmirror?

How do i reconfigure the current smvi policies to backup/save all future snapshots over onto the 7.2k drives once all of the data is moved. We are talking maybe a couple TB at most. so i can then free up space on my 15k spindles?

ekashpureff
2,626 Views

rbauman -

You're very welcome.

Yes, It is SnapVault I'd recommend for your needs.

The reson to use SnapVault over SnapMirror is that you can retain snapshots for a longer schedule on the secondary. With SnapMirror you copy the full volume with snapshots, and you'd have to retain all of those older snapshots on the primary. SnapVault would allow you to retain the old snaps on the secondary SATA drives without retaining them on the primary. You'd be able to free up the old snap space on those expensive 15K spindles. This is the value proposition of SnapVault.

I'd use DFM aka now OnCommand Unified Manager to manage the snapshot relationships, rather than SMVI.

BTW - SMVI is now VSC - Virtual Storage Console, you may want to upgrade ?

Wish I could have you in class for a week to explain this all further...

I hope this response has been helpful to you.

At your service,

Eugene E. Kashpureff, Sr.

Independent NetApp Consultant, K&H Research http://www.linkedin.com/in/eugenekashpureff

Senior NetApp Instructor, IT Learning Solutions http://sg.itls.asia/netapp

(P.S. I appreciate points for helpful or correct answers.)

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