Creating and Sharing a Volume Group

Nutanix
Audience
Public
Product
FlashArray
FlashArray > Purity//FA
Technology Integrations
Source Type
Documentation
  1. Create the Volume Group
    Log into Prism Central.
  2. Navigate to Storage > Volume Groups.
  3. Click Create Volume Group.

  4. Basics: Provide a Name (e.g., VGroup-01), optional description and select the appropriate Target Cluster.

  5. Click Add New Disk.

    • Storage Container: Choose the container that is backed by the FlashArray (NVMeof-TCP).

    • Size: Enter the required capacity for the shared volume.

    • Click Add.

    • Repeat the above steps if your cluster requires multiple disks (e.g., Data, Logs, and Quorum).

    After completing the initial Configuration tab (naming the VG and adding disks from the FlashArray-backed container), proceed to the Connections tab to define your access method:

  6. Select Client Type:

    • Virtual Machines: Select this for VMs running natively on the local Nutanix AHV cluster. This uses the hypervisor (VirtIO SCSI) to present storage, removing the need for manual in-guest iSCSI/NVMe configuration.

    • External Clients: Select this to present storage to bare-metal servers, physical nodes, or VMs on remote clusters (e.g., ESXi/Hyper-V). This exposes the VG as a network-accessible target via the Nutanix Data Services IP.

  7. Set Shared Status to "Shared":

    1. This is a requirement for clustered workloads (such as Windows Server Failover Clustering or Oracle RAC). It enables the necessary coordination between multiple nodes to manage disk ownership and access.

  8. Configure Connections:

    1. For Virtual Machines: Use the dropdown menu to search for and select the specific guest VMs that require access.

    2. For External Clients: Manually add the Initiator IQN (for iSCSI) for each external server to the allowlist.

  9. Load Balance Volume Group:

    The Load Balance Volume Group toggle determines how Nutanix AHV distributes the I/O paths for the Volume Group across the CVMs (Controller VMs) in the cluster.

    • When to use: Enable this for high-performance workloads (such as large SQL Server or Oracle databases) to prevent a single Nutanix node from becoming an I/O bottleneck by spreading the storage traffic across multiple CVMs.

    • When not to use: Disable this (or leave it at default) for smaller, low-I/O workloads where load balancing is not required or in scenarios where data locality is required.

  10. Complete the Wizard: Proceed through the Management and Review tabs to finalize the Volume Group.
  11. Click Save.