topic adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020 in ONTAP Hardware

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

dormelchen — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 07:04:49 GMT

hello,

we have an FAS2020 with Disks in the head.

Now we want to add an additional shelf

i know how to plugin..

but thats it.

How can i add the "new" disks to the existing aggregate ?

Spare Disks.. etc.

Is there an How to ? Best practice ?

Thank you

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheimberg — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 12:21:01 GMT

after connecting the shelf to the controller you should be able to see the disks on the commandline by

>disk show -n

Because of software-ownership you first must assign the disks to a controller

>disk assign 0a.16 -o <controller>

If options disk.autoassign is enabled, all the other disks are assigned automatically, otherwise use

>disk assign all -o <controller>

So now you should see the disks as spares by

>sysconfig -r

and from here you can add them now to an aggregate or create a new aggregate.

Don't you have a NetApp partner or consultant?

regards

Mark

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

dormelchen — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 12:50:55 GMT

thanks -

we have an partner / consultant... but.. save money....

so i had to do this

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

dormelchen — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 13:40:10 GMT

btw..

is there an problem:

Raid4 config Fas2020 head

adding this shelf to an existing aggr. ?

Has this shelf then Raid 4 too ?

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheimberg — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 14:33:49 GMT

If you extend the aggregate formed by internal disks with disks of the external shelf, then: yes, it will stay raid 4 because this is the aggr option.

Has the external shelf the same disk types and sizes as the internal disks?

If not, be careful what you do.

Mark

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

dormelchen — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 15:04:48 GMT

internal we have SAS 15000 (pysical 410 GB - netapp na_admin)

the new shelf DS14MK4 has 14 x 450 GB SAS

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

aborzenkov — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 15:04:56 GMT

If you extend the aggregate formed by internal disks with disks of the external shelf, then: yes, it will stay raid 4 because this is the aggr option.

Or you can change RAID type before adding more disks.

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheimberg — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 16:31:13 GMT

So you have the same disk type.

Theoretically you could extend your aggregate by the external disks.

Personally I would refrain from that. The shelf is then bound to the controller - if you need to upgrade to a more performant/newer/bigger/... system, you need more steps for migrating the data.

But there are different opinions around that....

Mark

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

RodrigoNascimento — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 18:37:06 GMT

I'm agree with Mark.

IMHO, for the FAS2000 family, you shouldn't mix internal disks with shelf (external) disks.

Cheers,

Nasc

NetApp: Enjoy it!

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

dormelchen — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 08:02:44 GMT

does changing the raid type has any effects on existing data ?

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

aborzenkov — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 08:44:56 GMT

No, it just adds (or removes) additional parity disk.

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

AARONLEWIS — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:16:46 GMT

Hi,

I've just added a DS14Mk4 to my production FAS2020. As we're a very small company, it's my only filer. It's running in Active/Active with 1 aggregate on each controller. I'm torn between two approaches:

1. simply adding new disks to each of the aggregates

2. creating a single aggregate on the DS14, moving the volumes from one of the controllers and expanding the aggregate on the 2020 to include all its' disks.

Now, I've tested the move in the simulator and it seems pretty straightforward. However, it does require a fairly significant downtime for some of my servers. The move seems like the right approach, but I'm wondering what the reasoning is behind not mixing internal and shelf disks on a 2020.

Thanks,

Aaron

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheinrich — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 08:16:49 GMT

Hi to all,

im reactivating this thread because ive a very similar situation. We have a FAS2020 with 12x410,73 GB SAS in Raid4 with 2 Controllers. Now, I want to extend with a new DS14MK4 with 14x450 GB SAS. There are some questions about the plugging that come to my mind (with the config after plugging/activiating the shelf, Im going to have no problems, I guess): we have the two active controllers on the main-system with both two ports (0a, 0b). On the new shelf, we have 4 ports, too, but als much i can see, there only 2 INPUT-ports (recognized by the direction of the displayed arrow) --> so, do i have to plug only the two input-ports and if so, with which of the main-system ports do i connect?

Thx for help, Maze

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheimberg — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 09:49:52 GMT

basic cabling:

top Controller:0a -> Shelf top ESH4:in

bottom Controller:0a -> Shelf bottom ESH4:in

if both FC ports are free you may setup HA cabling:

Shelf top ESH4:out -> bottom Controller:0b

Shelf bottom ESH4:out -> top Controller:0b

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheinrich — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 09:58:54 GMT

Hi and Thank you!

Markus Heimberg schrieb:

if both FC ports are free you may setup HA cabling:

Shelf top ESH4:out -> bottom Controller:0b

Shelf bottom ESH4:out -> top Controller:0b

so, this is optional?? what's the effect of this? which ports exaclty do you mean with "if both ports are free"?

Sorry for my questions may sound a little stupid 😉

maze

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

andrc — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 23:59:53 GMT

HA Multipathing is optional, it's just an extra path to the disks giving you redundancy if one path fails. You need to have enough controller ports available to cable this up as it uses double the ports of non-multipathed cabling.

adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheimberg — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 06:21:32 GMT

so, this is optional?? what's the effect of this? which ports exaclty do you mean with "if both ports are free"?

As andrc alread wrote: HA cabling is optional. Regarding the ports: each controller module 2040 in the chasiss has to FC ports: 0a and 0b (as you already know and wrote yourself). "free" simply means: if nothing else is plugged in there or planned to plug (SAN).

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheinrich — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 08:05:42 GMT

Thanx for your replies!! I just was confused while the cabling to the "B-Ports" of the main-system is the other way around compared to the "A-Cabling": top to bottom and bottom to top.

So, as a matter of fact, my ports are "free" - so I can use the HA-Cabling.

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

mheinrich — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 13:24:21 GMT

So, finally I cabled all the ports inclusive HA-cabling. I pressed the power-buttons and could see the disks by typing disk show -n from the console. As the first step wanted to test-assign one of the new disk to controller 2 (disk assign 0a.16 -o controller2). That went straightforward but automatically continued with the assigning of all the other unowned disks to the same controller. That must be some kind of auto-assign that must be enabled, but it wasn't that what i wanted. Now, I'm wondering how I can move some of the auto-assigned disks to the other controller? I tried the "remove"-command on one disk, but all what happened, was one disk with the status "failed" instead of "Pool10". Need some help to get the stuff cleaned up! Thanx a lot!!

Greetz, Maze

Re: adding shelf / disks to an FAS2020

aborzenkov — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 06:28:29 GMT

Shelf hot plugging is supported and I have done it multiple times.