System Administration Guide: Basic Administration

Swap Space as a Dump Device

A dump device is usually disk space that is reserved to store system crash dump information. By default, a system's dump device is configured to be an appropriate swap partition. If possible, you should configure a alternate disk partition as a dedicated dump device instead to provide increased reliability for crash dumps and faster reboot time after a system failure. You can configure a dedicated dump device by using the dumpadm command. For more information, see “Managing System Crash Information (Tasks)” in System Administration Guide: Advanced Administration.

If you are using a volume manager to manage your disks, such as Solaris Volume Manager, do not configure your dedicated dump device to be under the control of Solaris Volume Manager. You can keep your swap areas under Solaris Volume Manager's control, which is a recommended practice. However, for accessibility and performance reasons, configure another disk as a dedicated dump device outside of Solaris Volume Manager's control.