Release Notes

10 VMware vSphere Virtual Volumes on Dell PS Series | 2028-N-WP-V
Figure 2 Protocol Endpoint as shown in vSphere Web Client
• Storage Container:
- A Storage Container is reserved space on the SAN that can be increased and decreased as needs change,
PS Series storage requires thick (or 100 percent) space reservation). It can also be conceptualized as a
type of folder object on the SAN for organizing multiple volumes together.
- Storage Containers are seen and treated as regular datastores by vSphere, and are referred to as a vVol-
type datastore. They can be browsed as normal as may be done when seeking virtual machine log files.
They enable many vSphere workflows to remain unchanged even though significant changes have
occurred.
- Multiple storage containers can exist within a PS Series group, up to 32, but they cannot span pool or be
migrated from one pool to another pool.
Figure 3 Datastores of type VMFS-5 and of type VVOL as shown in VSM plugin for vSphere Web Client
• Virtual Volumes:
- At a high level, an individual virtual volume is a regular volume to the SAN and it can be manipulated by
various SAN functions. However, from the vSphere perspective, an individual virtual volume is part of a
virtual machine; a complete virtual machine consists of several virtual volumes of different types. The SAN
is aware of the virtual volumes that belong to other virtual volumes because of information
communicated from vSphere through the VASA Provider.