DS6800

Virtualization Concepts
Rroot shell Technologiiss Pvt. Ltd.,
Hyderabad, India.
© Proprietary of Rrootshell

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IBM SAN DS6000 1 Virtualization Concepts
 Topics covered

• Array sites
• Arrays
• Ranks
• Extent pools
• Logical volumes
• Logical storage subsystems
• Address groups
• Volume groups
• Host attachments

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IBM SAN DS6000 2 Virtualization Concepts
 What is virtualization?

• Definition - virtualization is the abstraction process from

the physical disk drives to a logical volume that the hosts
and servers see as if it were a physical disk.
• Virtualization is the process of creating LUNs from a
bunch of physical disk drives (DDMs)

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IBM SAN DS6000 3 Virtualization Concepts
 Abstraction Layers for Disk Virtualization

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IBM SAN DS6000 4 Virtualization Concepts
 Array Sites
• An Array Site is a group of
four DDMs
• DDMs are chosen from the
same disk enclosure string for
an Array Site
• All DDMs in the Array Site
must be of the same type
• Array Sites are the building
blocks to define Arrays

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IBM SAN DS6000 5 Virtualization Concepts
 Arrays
• Arrays are created from
one or two Array Sites
• Forming an Array means
defining it for a specific
RAID type
• Supported RAID types are
RAID-5 and RAID-10
• Selecting a RAID type for
an Array is called defining
an Array

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IBM SAN DS6000 6 Virtualization Concepts
 Ranks
• A Rank is built using just one
array
• A Rank is created first and
Array is added to the Rank
• The available space in each
rank is divided into extents
• The extents are the building
blocks of the logical volumes
• An extent is striped across all
disks of an array

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IBM SAN DS6000 7 Virtualization Concepts
 Extent Pools
• An Extent Pool is a logical construction to aggregate the extents
from a set of ranks to form a domain for allocation to a logical
volume
• Typically, the set of Ranks in the extent pool have same RAID
type and same disk RPM characteristics
• One or more ranks with the same extent type can be assigned to
an extent pool.
• One rank can be assigned to only one extent pool.
• There can be as many extent pools as there are ranks.
• The minimum number of extent pools is one
• Extend Pools can be expanded by adding more ranks

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IBM SAN DS6000 8 Virtualization Concepts
 Logical volumes

• A logical volume is composed of a set of extents from one

extent pool.
• On a DS6000 up to 8192 (8K) volumes can be created
• Fixed block LUNs
• CKD volumes

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IBM SAN DS6000 9 Virtualization Concepts
 Logical volumes - Fixed block LUNs
• A logical volume composed of fixed block extents is called
a LUN.
• A fixed block LUN is composed of one or more 1 GB
extents from one FB extent pool.
• A LUN cannot span multiple extent pools, but a LUN can
have extents from different ranks within the same extent
pool.
• The capacity allocated to a LUN is always a multiple of
the 1 GB extent, so any LUN size that is not a multiple of
1 GB wastes some space in the last extent allocated to the
LUN.

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IBM SAN DS6000 10 Virtualization Concepts
 Creation of Fixed block LUN

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IBM SAN DS6000 11 Virtualization Concepts
 Logical volumes – CKD volumes
• A System z CKD volume is composed of one or more
extents from one CKD extent pool.
• CKD extents are in unit size of 3390 Model 1, which has
1113 cylinders.
• If the number of cylinders specified is not an integral
multiple of 1113 cylinders, then some space in the last
allocated extent is wasted.
• For maximum storage efficiency, volumes should be exact
multiples of 1113 cylinders.
• A CKD volume cannot span multiple extent pools, but a
volume can have extents from different ranks in the same
extent pool.

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IBM SAN DS6000 12 Virtualization Concepts
 Allocation of a CKD logical volume

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IBM SAN DS6000 13 Virtualization Concepts
 Logical Subsystems
• A logical subsystem (LSS) is another logical construct.
• Logical Subsystem groups LUNs
• The capacity of one or more ranks can be aggregated into an
extent pool and logical volumes configured in that extent
pool are not bound to any specific rank.
• Different logical volumes on the same logical subsystem can
be configured in different extent pools.
• The available capacity of the storage facility can be flexibly
allocated across the set of defined logical subsystems and
logical volumes.
• Upto 32 LSSs can be defined for DS6000

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IBM SAN DS6000 14 Virtualization Concepts
 Address Groups
• Address groups are created automatically when the first LSS
associated with the address group is created
• And deleted automatically when the last LSS in the address group is
deleted.
• LSSs are either CKD LSSs or FB LSSs. All devices in an LSS must be
either CKD or FB.
• LSSs are grouped into address groups of 16 LSSs.
• LSSs are numbered X'ab', where a is the address group and b denotes
an LSS within the address group. (for example, X'10' to X'1F' are
LSSs in address group 1)
• All LSSs within one address group have to be of the same type, CKD
or FB. The first LSS defined in an address group fixes the type of that
address group.

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IBM SAN DS6000 15 Virtualization Concepts
 Address Groups

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IBM SAN DS6000 16 Virtualization Concepts
 Volume Access
• Host Attachment
• Volume Group

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IBM SAN DS6000 17 Virtualization Concepts
 Host Attachment
• HBAs are identified to the DS6000 in a host attachment
construct that specifies the HBA's World Wide Port Names
(WWPNs).
• A set of host ports can be associated through a port group
attribute that allows a set of HBAs to be managed
collectively. This port group is referred to as host
attachment within the GUI.
• A given host attachment can be associated with only one
volume group. Each host attachment can be associated
with a volume group to define which LUNs that HBA is
allowed to access.

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IBM SAN DS6000 18 Virtualization Concepts
 Host Attachment
• Multiple host attachments can share the same volume
group. The host attachment can also specify a port mask
that controls which DS6000 I/O ports that the HBA is
allowed to log in to.
• Whichever ports the HBA logs in on, it sees the same
volume group that is defined in the host attachment
associated with this HBA.
• The maximum number of host attachments on a DS6000 is
1024.

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IBM SAN DS6000 19 Virtualization Concepts
 Volume Group
• A host attachment object that identifies the HBA is linked
to a specific volume group.
• The user must define the volume group by indicating
which fixed block logical volumes are to be placed in the
volume group.
• Logical volumes might be added to or removed from any
volume group dynamically.
• There are two types of volume groups used with Open
Systems hosts and the type determines how the logical
volume number is converted to a host addressable
LUN_ID on the Fibre Channel SCSI interface.

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IBM SAN DS6000 20 Virtualization Concepts
 Volume Group

• A map volume group type is used in conjunction with FC

SCSI host types that poll for LUNs by walking the address
range on the SCSI interface. This type of
• volume group can map any FB logical volume numbers to
256 LUN_IDs that have zeroes in
• the last six bytes and the first two bytes in the range of
X'0000' to X'00FF'.

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IBM SAN DS6000 21 Virtualization Concepts
 Virtualization Hierarchy

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IBM SAN DS6000 22 Virtualization Concepts