1. Installing and Configuring an Oracle Solaris Cluster 4.4 Environment
  2. Planning the Oracle Solaris Cluster Configuration
  3. Planning Global Devices, Device Groups, and Cluster File Systems
  4. Planning Device Groups

Planning Device Groups

For information about the purpose and function of device groups, see Device Groups in Concepts for Oracle Solaris Cluster 4.4.

Consider the following points when you plan device groups:

  • Failover – You can configure multihost disks and properly configured volume-manager devices as failover devices. Proper configuration of a volume-manager device includes multihost disks and correct setup of the volume manager itself. This configuration ensures that multiple nodes can host the exported device. You cannot configure tape drives, CD-ROMs or DVD-ROMs, or single-ported devices as failover devices.

  • Mirroring – You must mirror the disks to protect the data from disk failure. See Mirroring Guidelines for additional guidelines. See Configuring Solaris Volume Manager Software and your volume-manager documentation for instructions about mirroring.

  • Storage-based replication – Disks in a device group must be either all replicated or none replicated. A device group cannot use a mix of replicated and nonreplicated disks.