Chapter 6 — Configuring and Managing Partitions Partition Configuration Overview
December 2019 User Guide—Spectra T200, T380, and T680 Libraries
181
Configuring and Using Storage Partitions
You can configure storage partitions either before or after you configure
cleaning partitions. However, if you know that you want to use Auto
Drive Clean with a storage partition, it is easier to configure the
cleaning partition before you configure the storage partition. If you
choose to create the storage partition before you create the cleaning
partition, you need to modify the storage partition to assign the
cleaning partition to it (thereby enabling Auto Drive Clean for the
partition).
The library requires, at a minimum, one storage partition to be
configured before you can use the library. Each storage partition must
have a minimum of one chamber assigned to the storage pool. Each
storage partition must also have at least one drive assigned to it.
When using multiple tape technology generations, Spectra Logic
strongly recommends configuring separate partitions for each
generation.
When using a combination of Fibre Channel, SAS, and/or SCSI drives in
the library, the drives using each interface must be in separate partitions.
Chamber Availability — The number of chambers available for a
storage partition depends on how many chambers in the library are
licensed, how many chambers are used by other partitions, and
whether or not Thin Provisioning is enabled.
If Thin Provisioning is not enabled, the library automatically makes
any licensed chambers that are not already configured for use in
another partition available to be configured in the new partition. If
all of the licensed chambers in your library are already assigned to
existing partitions, you must modify one or more partitions to make
chambers available for creating a new partition (see Modifying an
Existing Partition on page 211). You may also be able to license more
chambers or make hardware upgrades that increase the storage
capacity of the library (see Hardware Expansion and Upgrades on
page 527).
If Thin Provisioning is enabled, up to a combined total of 1,000
elements, including storage slots (not chambers), entry/exit slots
(not chambers), and drives are available for each partition, no
matter how many chambers are licensed or already assigned to
existing partitions. Using Thin Provisioning, it is possible for the
combined configured number of storage slots in all partitions to
exceed the licensed or physically available number of slots. Empty
slots are inaccessible elements until a TeraPack magazine is
imported into a partition. At that time, the slots are made accessible
to only the partition into which the magazine was imported.
To Next Page
