HPE Storage Users Group

Is creating a physical copy a good way to back a duplicate of the current volume to export?

Would a virtual copy be exportable immediately?

Trying to figure out fastest way to create a copy of a 2.4TB volume.

Virtual Copy is fastest way. We have had long debates about this and physical copy is really not necessary in most cases. It is more useful in traditional arrays where a volume is on a specific set of disks and you want to have a copy that does not compete for the same IOPs that a volume with a limited set of disks will provide. In the 3par the technology is such that your data is spread across all drives anyway and you are competing against other volumes in theory on any given physical disk. We started out making a few physical copies and moved away from that. The only scenario that a physical may still be useful is if you may be spawning numerous copies and in that case making a physical copy then making virtuals of that physical can be a little cleaner to manage, but it has trade offs as well. We have not done physical copies in over 2 years, yet we make dozens and dozens of virtuals all the time. A virtual refreshes instantaneously, while a physical needs to copy all the changed blocks over so in your case a 2.4TB physical will likely takes hours and hours to create and to refresh. Go virtual.

Thanks for the reply.

The 'copy' VV will be needed next Tuesday for exporting to another host. I'm thinking about creating a Virtual copy this afternoon and letting it stay in sync...and then Tuesday, do I break the sync relationship and export to the other host?