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VMax3/PowerMax Deallocation Steps

Steps to perform Full and Partial reclamation of SAN devices provisioned from Dell EMC VMax3/PowerMax to a standalone Server.

Dell EMC VMax3/PowerMax Deallocation

We will be using the above setup to go through the various steps. There are 2 devices( Gold SLO ) assigned to Server1 from a PowerMax/Vmax3 storage Array through Autoprovisioning Groups. These devices configured as part of a filesystem and making use of by some Application or Database running in the server.

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1. Full Reclaim

Remove all the SAN Storage allocated to the Server. This possibly include below activities.

At Server Side:

  1. Stop all the Applications/Databases.
  2. Unmount/Delete the filesystems
  3. Remove all the SAN devices from the Operating System.
  4. Remove physical cable connectivity from the Server HBAs to the SAN switches.
  5. Power off the server.

At Switch Side:

  1. Confirm the HBA ports are no longer connected to the switches( verification of step.4 on server side.).
  2. Delete and remove the related Zones from the Active Zoneset.( Refer : Removal of existing Zone from active Zoneset for Cisco MDS Switches.

Once the above steps are done, we can start the reclamation process from the storage end.

1

Remove Masking View and Unmap devices

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symaccess -sid 1234 delete view -name MV_Server1_NSHD -unmap
2

Remove Initiator Groups

# Remove Child IG
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symaccess -sid 1234 delete -name IG_Server1 -type initiator -force

# Remove Parent IG
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symaccess -sid 1234 delete -name IG_Server1_NSHD -type initiator

# Delete login history of HBA WWPNs
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symaccess -sid 1234 remove -wwn 1000000000000001 -login
symaccess -sid 1234 remove -wwn 1000000000000002 -login
3

Delete Port Group

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symaccess -sid 1234 delete -name PG_Server1_NSHD -type port -force

Note: Some environment have shared Port Groups and it may be part of some other Masking View. In that case, don't delete the portgroup.

4

Delete Storage Groups

# Delete Child SG
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symaccess -sid 1234 delete -name SG_Server1_NSHD_Gold -type storage -force

# Delete Parent SG
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symaccess -sid 1234 delete -name SG_Server1_NSHD -type storage
5

Free and Delete TDEVS

# Free Devices
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symdev -sid 1234 -devs AAAAA,BBBBB free -all

# Delete Devices
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symdev -sid 1234 -devs AAAAA,BBBBB delete
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2. Partial Reclaim

This type of reclaim request demands the removal of only selected SAN devices provisioned to the Server( Removing device 'AAAAA' for example). The server will still have visibility to the remaining devices, all the physical cabling and zoning will be intact.

At Server Side:

  1. Remove the SAN device from the Operating System.

Once we have the confirmation from the server end that the device(s) have been removed from OS, following tasks can be performed at the Storage side.

1

Remove device from the Child Storage Group and Unmap

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symaccess -sid 1234 -type storage -name SG_Server1_NSHD_Gold remove devs AAAAA -unmap
2

Free and Delete TDEV

# Free Device
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symdev -sid 1234 -devs AAAAA free -all

# Delete Device
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symdev -sid 1234 -devs AAAAA delete