HP StorageWorks Continuous Access XP user guide for the XP10000/XP12000 (December 2005)

Continuous Access XP user guide for the XP10000/XP12000 31
Preparing for Continuous Access XP operations
System requirements
Continuous Access XP operations involve MCUs and RCUs containing primary and secondary volumes,
remote copy connections between MCUs and RCUs, UNIX and/or PC server hosts at primary and remote
sites, and Continuous Access XP. You can use the Command View XP management station or XP Remote
Web Console to manage MCUs and RCUs. Continuous Access XP system requirements are:
• MCU: Disk array with Continuous Access XP installed.
• RCU: Disk array with Continuous Access XP installed.
• UNIX-based and/or PC server platforms: The disk array supports Continuous Access XP operations for
a variety of UNIX and PC-server platforms, including the Sun
®
Solaris
®
, IBM
®
AIX
®
, HP-UX
®
, and
Windows NT
®
platforms. Contact your HP account support representative for the latest information on
XP10000/XP12000 platform support for Continuous Access XP.
• Remote copy connections – Fibre Channel:
• Multimode optical fibre cables at both the MCU and RCU
• For distances from 0.5 km to 11 km, multimode shortwave Fibre Channel interface cables with up to
two switches
• For distances greater than 11 km, approved third-party channel extender (or DWDM) products and
telecommunications lines
• Remote copy connections – serial:
• Multimode serial interface (ESCON) cables at both the MCU and RCU.
• For distances from 3 km to 43 km (1.9 to 26.7 miles), single-mode serial interface cables with
ESCON directors (ESCDs) and/or ESCON repeaters.
• For distances greater than 9 km (5.6 miles), extended distance facility (XDF) provided by the ESCDs
and/or ESCON repeaters.
• For distances greater than 43 km (26.7 miles), approved third-party channel extender products and
telecommunications lines. Long-distance solutions are provided based on user requirements and
workload characteristics. Usage of channel extenders may require additional disk array
configuration.
• Command View XP management station or XP Remote Web Console: Web-based GUI for Continuous
Access XP and license keys. You can access XP Remote Web Console directly from the disk array or
through Command View XP.
NOTE: You must operate Command View XP or XP Remote Web Console in Modify mode to perform
Continuous Access XP operations. In view mode, you can only view Continuous Access XP information.
Requirements and restrictions
Continuous Access XP has the following requirements and restrictions:
• One-to-one volume copy operations
• Logical unit (LU) type (also called device emulation or type)
• Consistency groups
• Accessing Continuous Access XP P-VOLs and S-VOLs
• Cache and NVS
• Host failover software
• Duplicate volume
• Host system crash
One-to-one volume copy operations
Continuous Access XP requires a one-to-one relationship between logical volumes of volume pairs. A
volume (LU) can only be assigned to one Continuous Access XP pair at a time. Continuous Access XP does