HA Group Notification from Secondary Controller (SPARES_LOW) WARNING

[Hinstorff]

Hello,

we have a Netapp FAS-2240 with two controllers and HA and this runs since 4 years. Today we get a warning "(SPARES_LOW) WARNING" from our secondary controller. But we take a look to our primary and see two spare disk nad no problemes. This disk are also listed on secondary but not as spare. It something wrong or can i ignore this warning?

[SeanHatfield]

From your secondary, run aggr status -r and check that it has a spare.  Also look for any drives marked failed or reconstructing. 

[Hinstorff]

Hello,

first thanks for your answer.

Actually we have no spares on secondary controller. The spare Disk are only listed as partner disks.

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Pool1 spare disks (empty)
Pool0 spare disks (empty)

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The two spares are only listed on primary.

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RAID Disk    Device      HA  SHELF BAY CHAN Pool Type  RPM  Used (MB/blks)    Phys (MB/blks)
---------    ------      ------------- ---- ---- ---- ----- --------------    --------------
Spare disks for block checksum
spare       0a.00.4     0a    0   4   SA:A   0  BSAS  7200 1695466/3472315904 1695759/3472914816
spare       0a.00.7     0a    0   7   SA:A   0  BSAS  7200 1695466/3472315904 1695759/3472914816

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No disk is marked failed or reconstructing. So here my question, must i unassign one spare on primary and take it to secondary?

Example

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primary     > disk assign 0a.00.7 -s unowned

secondary > disk assign 0a.00.7

[SeanHatfield · Accepted solution]

Must is a strong word.  It depends.  If your configuration is active/active, then yes assign the secondary a spare.  If your configuration is active/idle, there are arguments to be made either way. 

[Hinstorff]

Thanks Sean.

[Naveenkumarp22]

Its better to maintain spares on both the controllers. You should maintain 1 spare disk for 30 disks, this the best practice recommended by Netapp.