Most Common Storage Solutions

The following are the most commonly requested storage related solutions.

Preparing Storage for Datakeeper Usage

Summary:

This video explains the procedure for creating/preparing storage for Datakeeper. It also addresses creating a mirror between both Source and Target nodes.

For additional information regarding storage in conjunction with Datakeeper, please refer to Most Common Storage Solutions and Creating a Mirror.

Why don’t I see my Target Drive when creating a mirror?

Target Volume Not Available During Mirror Creation

Issue:

A new volume on a Target node has just been formatted, assigned a letter and put online. On the Source node when creating the mirror, the newly assigned volume/drive letter is not posted in the drop down box.

Recommendation/Solution:

Go to Services and restart the “SIOS DataKeeper” Service

OR

From the command line type:

net stop “SIOS DataKeeper” Service, then
net start “SIOS DataKeeper” Service

Recreate the mirror, starting on the Source node and now via your drop down box you should be able to select the newly created Target Volume.

Status = 33 When Creating a New Mirror

Issue:

When trying to create a new mirror via the DataKeeper GUI or from an emcmd . createmirror command you may receive a Status = 33 message.

Probable cause: a pagefile may be located on the Target volume. Pagefiles are prohibted on DataKeeper volumes.

Solution:

Relocate the pagefile

Ways to relocate the pagefile:

Disk Management applet

Because the pagefile is a hidden system file, you will need to modify the folder attributes so that you can see this file. Go to Control Panel\Appearance\Folder Options, the View Tab, select “Show hidden files, folders, and drives”. Now the Volume will show pagefile.sys.

If the file needs to be relocated, go to Control Panel\System and Security\System, Performance, Settings, Advanced, Virtual Memory/Change, deselect “Automatically manage paging file size for all drives”. Select the drive for the new pagefile location, Customize size, then press Set.

Note: This may require a reboot.

In the DataKeeper Action Panel, why are Switchover, Delete Job and other functions not available?

• Creating a DataKeeper Volume Resource in WSFC
  
  

How to Remove DataKeeper Storage from a Windows Server Failover Cluster Role

Scenario:

Remove an existing DataKeeper Resource/Mirror from Windows Server Failover Clustering:

• Without impacting the existing role in WSFC, i.e. File Shares, SAP, Oracle, SQL
• Without having to run various emcmd commands (e.g. deletelocalmirroronly, cleanupmirror)
  
  
  p(banner tip). Note: In the DataKeeper UI, the Action Panel shows “Switchover Mirrors”, “Delete Job” and “Delete Mirror” are grayed out.
  
  

Reason: When a DataKeeper mirror is or becomes a part of a cluster/WSFC, all administration takes place at the WSFC level.

Steps to Remove:

In Failover Cluster Manager:

• From the Roles panel, select Storage and the related DataKeeper Volume
  • Right click and select “Remove from the role you’ve created’ “ and say Yes
• From WFSC select Storage\Disk
  • The DataKeeper Volume is now listed as/Assigned To, Available Storage
    • Select Remove and and select Yes

The DataKeeper Storage is no longer a resource in the cluster/WSFC.

Now that the aforementioned tasks have been completed in the DataKeeper UI, in the Action Panel:

• Select “Delete Job”
• You will be prompted, “Are you sure you want to delete the ‘Volume (drive)’ and its mirror? Select Yes
• If you have multiple mirrors/Target, select “Delete Mirror”, thus its job will be deleted also
  
  

How do I remove my mirror/volume from an existing cluster?

How can I expand (resize) my disks?

• DataKeeper Volume Resize
  
  

Volume List in Disk Management Not Reporting the Correct Size after Extending

Issue:

I have resized but Disk Management is not reporting the correct size.

The following steps extend a mirrored volume:

• Pause and Unlocked the mirror
• Via Disk Manager, extend the volume for the Source and Target
• Continue and Lock All Mirrors

At that time in Disk Management, the OS was NOT reporting the Extended Size.

Solution:

Via DISKPART, the volume needs to be selected, then the volume needs to be extended.

Upon completion, Disk Management will reflect the correct values.

Also, if you extend the volume using DISKPART, you will need to extend the file system in DISKPART (Disk Management will extend the volume and the file system but DISKPART only extends the volume).

Here is the command in DISKPART to extend the file system after extending the volume in DISKPART:

select file system=D

extend filesystem

If needed run:

emcmd . updatevolumeinfo <volume letter>

This command will ensure that DataKeeper will see the updated size of the volume.

Troubleshooting Resizing Issues

I have properly resized my Source and/or Targets (properly performed the resizing e.g. AWS, Azure, VMware, Hyper-V and other host/bare metal platforms). However in Disk Management, those changes are not readily reflected as these are known issues per Microsoft.

To ensure that the Source and Target are the same size or the Target is larger, perform the following:

Use the emcmd . getvolumeinfo command:

C:\Program Files (x86)\SIOS\DataKeeper>emcmd Sourceservername getvolumeinfo e 1

—————————————————————- LEVEL 1 INFO —-
Volume Root = E:
Last Modified = Sun Jan 10 23:21:40 2021
Mirror Role = SOURCE
Label = SQL Data
FileSystem = NTFS
Total Space = 4291817472
Num Targets = 1
Attributes : 0h

I rem out/filter the other Volume attributes therefore for the Source only reflects:
C:\Program Files (x86)\SIOS\DataKeeper>emcmd Sourceservername getvolumeinfo e 1 |findstr Total
Total Space = 4291817472

Filter for the Target:
C:\Program Files (x86)\SIOS\DataKeeper>emcmd Targetservername getvolumeinfo e 1 |findstr Total
Total Space = 4291817472

The aforementioned gives you a view of the Total Space/Total Capacity.

If the Target is Locked, Access is Denied or Not Available then your output will reflect:
Total Space = N/A

Note: This is still under investigation, we have experienced Total Space will sometimes yield a Total Space value when locked.

• As an alternative method, while at your elevated Administrator command prompt, consider executing the following:

emcmd . updatevolumeinfo (drive letter)

This command causes the SIOS DataKeeper service to query the driver for the correct mirror state. This command is useful if the DataKeeper GUI displays information that appears to be incorrect or not up-to-date. It is also useful with updating the Disk Management UI.

• A third method is to review the Total Capacity of the Source/Target in Disk Management:
  • Select the drive, choose Properties and view Capacity. Capacity equals Total Capacity as also reflected in the emcmd . getvolumeinfo output.

If any of the aforementioned steps are NOT yielding the proper sizes after resizing, please perform any of the following:

• In Disk Management, Offline the Disk in question (e.g. Disk 1, Disk 2), then Online. This action will update the partition tables to reflect the correct sizes. If performing this on the Source, you may want to inform users first, as they won’t be able to access a(n) Offline Disk. There are no problems with these actions on a Targeted Volume.

• Rebooting the Target is also a welcomed measure for refreshing the disks and related size changes.

• Use DISKPART to ensure the resize changes get accurately propagated:

From an elevated Administrator command prompt:
type DISKPART
DISKPART> list volume
DISKPART> select volume # (where # is the number of the affected volume which can be found with list volume)
DISKPART> extend filesystem
Now the file system size should match the new partition size.
Type Exit to leave DISKPART and return to your command prompt
Upon completion, from the DataKeeper UI, select Continue and Lock All Mirrors

Raw Volume

Issue:

• Able to create a mirror
• Once created and the emcmd . unlockvolume command is executed, the Targeted volume enters into a RAW state per Disk Management

Solution:

• Verify that the Bytes Per Physical Sector are identical on both the Source and Targeted volumes.

Below is example of the output generated for Volume E, from the fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo {drive letter} command:

C:\Windows\System32>fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo e:
NTFS Volume Serial Number : 0×26ace2a1ace26aaf
NTFS Version : 3.1
LFS Version : 2.0
Number Sectors : 0×00000000009fe7ff
Total Clusters : 0×000000000013fcff
Free Clusters : 0×00000000000dc0b3
Total Reserved : 0×0000000000000400
Bytes Per Sector : 512
Bytes Per Physical Sector : 512
Bytes Per Cluster : 4096
Bytes Per FileRecord Segment : 1024
Clusters Per FileRecord Segment : 0
Mft Valid Data Length : 0×0000000000040000
Mft Start Lcn : 0×0000000000040000
Mft2 Start Lcn : 0×0000000000000002
Mft Zone Start : 0×0000000000040040
Mft Zone End : 0×000000000004c840
Max Device Trim Extent Count : 4096
Max Device Trim Byte Count : 0xffffffff
Max Volume Trim Extent Count : 62
Max Volume Trim Byte Count : 0×40000000
Resource Manager Identifier : 5E5AB85D-6A6A-11E8-A950-00155D667911

How can I change my partition type from MBR to GPT?

Note: MBR has a 2 TB limitation

How to transition existing MBR volumes to GPT

The steps to take in achieving this are as follows for a 1×1 configuration. The volumes in the example will be E and F:

• In Server A, create 2 new mirrors. One from volume E to one of the new volumes (e.g. volume X), and another from volume F to the other new volume (e.g. volume Y).
• See Disk-to-Disk replication
  
  Once both mirrors have fully synced, proceed to delete the mirrors as volumes that are used for Disk-to-Disk replication can’t also be configured to replicate to another system.
  
  To delete the mirrors:

1. Select the job that contains the mirror you want to delete
2. Right-click on the mirror and choose “Delete Mirror” or select “Delete Mirror” from the Actions task pane
3. Select Yes to delete the mirror
4. The mirror will be deleted and removed from the associated job

*Note: If the Delete Mirror option is grayed out (not available), this could mean the volume is under clustering protection (Microsoft clustering or SIOS Protection Suite clustering).

• Once the mirrors have been deleted, create another 2 new mirrors, this time from Server A to Server B
• Ensure that the new volumes on B share the same letters as those on A (e.g. volume X and Y), as well as other considerations from the documentation:
  
  See Creating a Mirror
  

OR

Transition existing mirrors using MBR volumes to GPT volumes in a 1×1×1 configuration:

• In DataKeeper for Volume E “Pause and Unlock All Mirrors”
• On the Targets, Server B and Server C, in Disk Management, Delete Volume . . .
• On the Targets, Server B and Server C, in Disk Management, create the partitions as GPT

*NOTE: Before you Continue and Lock All Mirrors in DataKeeper, verify the size(s) of the Source and Target are of equal size or the Target is larger than the Source.

• Once the sizes has been verified, select “Continue and Lock All Mirrors”
• The mirror will enter into a Resyncing state in the DataKeeper UI
  
  Once the mirrors have completed their FULL resync on Server B & Server C, in Failover Clustering perform a move of your Role/Resource.
  Now Server B or Server C becomes a Source and you can use the aforementioned steps to change Volume E on Server A from MBR to GPT.
  
  
  

Does DataKeeper Support GPT (GUID Partition Table) Partitions?

Yes, DataKeeper supports GPT (GUID Partition Table) partitions.

Mirroring can be accomplished via the following partitioning schemes:

• MBR to GPT
• GPT to GPT

*NOTE: The aforementioned schemes are based on newly created partitions. Converting either MBR or GPT requires the partition to
be deleted.