Creating vdisks and NSDs

You can create vdisks and NSDs using IBM Storage Scale RAID commands or using the IBM Storage Scale System 3200 GUI.

After you create a vdisk using the mmcrvdisk command, you can create NSDs using the mmcrnsd command.

Alternatively, when you use the IBM Storage Scale System 3200 GUI to create a file system, the GUI creates the vdisks and NSDs as well. NSDs and vdisks that are created using IBM Storage Scale RAID commands are ignored by the IBM Storage Scale System 3200 GUI and cannot be used for creating a file system using the IBM Storage Scale System 3200 GUI file system creation wizard, which is launched by using the Create File System action in the Files > File Systems view. Users who plan to create file systems using the IBM Storage Scale System 3200 GUI must not create vdisks and NSDs using IBM Storage Scale RAID commands.

The relationship between vdisks and NSDs is as follows:
  • GPFS file systems are built from vdisk NSDs in the same way as they are built from any other NSDs.
  • While an NSD exists for a vdisk, that vdisk cannot be deleted.
  • A node cannot serve vdisk-based NSDs and non-vdisk-based NSDs.
  • Vdisk NSDs should not be used as tiebreaker disks.
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