vxvmconvert - LVM to VxVM Conversion - Anyone Used this already?

[Alzhy]

I've done tests with small LVM VG's (simple LVOLs - no stripes) and the conversion is a breeze. However, I've yet to try how say a terabyte sized (or more) LVM VG will do.

Has anyone done any large scale LVM to VxVM conversions yet? We're studying whether to just do dd/cpio/vxdump-restore to move our LVM managed storage from an existing array to VxVM managed ones on a new array.

[Mark Greene_1]

I'd like to go to VxVM, but last I checked it still wasn't compatible with EMC's Clariion SAN, and it's not at all apparent whether it's EMC or HP or both that need to address this.

mark

[Alzhy]

Am happy to report that with VxVM Patch Update 7 on HP-UX 11i - vxvmconvert works like a charm! Very very fast indeed and no issues encountered so far.

Mark, the problem you're having with VxVM is probably because you not have the Veritas ASL (Array Support Library) for your kind of array. Specific versions for each array is available at the Veritas support website.

[Albert Smith_1]

Do you need to have a full veritas license for this or will it work with the base version shipped with 11i?

[Alzhy]

Actualy I have not tried. I suppose it will.

[Joseph Loo]

hi,

as Mark has mentioned, EMC does seem to have some problem with VxVM.

in fact, this EMC engineer was suggesting to stick with LVM and not move to VxVM, giving me the impression that EMC is waiting for HP (or should it be VERITAS) to resolve the issue.

regards.

[Rita C Workman]

Seems to me I read recently that EMC and HP have resolved their legal disputes.
http://www.emc.com/news/press_releases/view.jsp?id=3106

So my guess.....they will get this resolved. Although I haven't made the switch to VxVM, it does look like this may very well be the eventuality that will have to be addressed....in the future, not today.

Rgrds,
Rita

[Alzhy]

We've recently converted (via VxVMConvert) about 50 TB worth of EVA Data on about a dozen very large servers to VxVM. 90% converted cleanly while the rest we had to do dd copies. This was the precursor to the migration to a large HP XP12000 array (a Hitachi technology actually). After the conversion, we employ VxVM's FlashSnap product to do split mirror backups from the XP12K to the EVA and other arrays - so we're no longer beholden to an array architecture for our backup and data mobility needs. And we are now actually better off than the LVM-EVA5K-BusinessCopy solution.

VxVM's integration on HP-UX11i I think was done superbly. Unbeknownst to most HP-UX hardcore admins, VxVM's tight integration with HP-UX started with the SEP 2002 release. Since HP-UX already uses Veritas' Filesystem Product VxFS -(Aka Online JFS), I think HP made the right move to just simply adopt VxVM based products (and VxFS) to further strengthen HP-UX 11i instead of what could have been a costly (and probably unstable) integration of Tru64's AdvFS and TruCluster functionality.