Introduction to the IBM DS8880
This chapter introduces the features and functions of the IBM DS8880 as available with microcode Release 8.3 and prior versions. More information about functions and features is provided in subsequent chapters.
This chapter covers the following topics:
The previous DS8870 model is described in IBM DS8870 Architecture and Implementation (Release 7.5), SG24-8085.
1.1 Introduction to the IBM DS8880
The IBM DS8000 family is a high-performance, high capacity, highly secure, and resilient series of disk storage systems. The DS8880 family is the latest and most advanced of the DS8000 offerings to date. The high availability, multiplatform support, including IBM Z, and simplified management tools help provide a cost-effective path to an on-demand world.
The current IBM DS8880 family includes the following three high-performance models:
•DS8884 – Business Class
•DS8886 – Enterprise Class
•DS8888 – Analytics Class
These additions to the family expand on features that clients expect from a high-end storage system:
•High performance
•High capacity
•High availability
•Cost efficiency
•Energy efficiency
•Scalability
•Business continuity and data protection functions
The DS8880 (Figure 1-1) supports the most demanding business applications with its exceptional all-around performance and data throughput.
Figure 1-1 DS8884 40U Rack and the expanded DS8886/DS8888 46U Rack
The DS8880 architecture is server-based. Two powerful POWER8 processor-based servers manage the cache to streamline disk I/Os, maximizing performance and throughput. These capabilities are further enhanced with the availability of high-performance flash enclosures (HPFEs). An HPFE Gen-2 can now be installed in most models. It is described in DS8880 High-Performance Flash Enclosure Gen2, REDP-5422.
Combined with world-class business resiliency and encryption features, the DS8880 provides a unique combination of high availability, performance, and security. The DS8880 is equipped with encryption-capable disk drives. Encryption-capable solid-state flash drives (SSDs) and high-performance flash drives are also available. High-density storage enclosures offer a considerable reduction in the footprint and energy consumption. Figure 1-2 shows an all-flash configuration.
Figure 1-2 DS8888 all-flash system
 
Reduced footprint: The DS8880 is housed in a 19-inch wide rack.
The DS8880 includes a power architecture that is based on direct current uninterruptible power supply (DC-UPS). The DC-UPS converts incoming AC line voltage to rectified AC and contains an integrated battery subsystem. The DC-UPS allows the DS8880 to achieve the highest energy efficiency in the DS8000 series. The DS8880 is designed to comply with the emerging ENERGY STAR specifications. The DS8888 All-Flash is available in 3-phase DC-UPS. The DS8886 is available in 3-phase or single-phase DC-UPS, and the DS8884 is available in single-phase DC-UPS. Figure 1-2 on page 5 shows the DS8888 All-Flash and the 3-phase DC-UPS.
I/O enclosures are attached to the POWER8 servers with Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) Generation 3 cables. The I/O enclosure has six PCIe adapter slots, two additional direct-attached, high-performance flash enclosure ports, and two zHyperlink ports that are new for DS8886 16-core models (256 GB or 512GB memory) with DS8000 microcode Release 8.3.
The rack also has an integrated keyboard and display pocket in the side wall that can be accessed from the front of the rack. A small form factor Hardware Management Console (HMC) is used on the DS8880. One or two HMCs are supported in the base rack. A unique feature of the new rack is the ability to expand from the height of a 40U configuration to a 46U configuration concurrently in the DS8886.
Figure 1-3 shows the differences in configuration that are available between the two sizes of the base frame with the single-phase DC-UPS. The expansion enables clients to add more capacity to their storage systems in the same footprint.
Figure 1-3 DS8886 40U (left) and DS8886 46U (right) fully configured base frames (985 model)
1.1.1 At-a-glance features of the DS8880
The DS8880 offers the following features (more details can be found in subsequent chapters of this book):
•The DS8880 is available in a variety of POWER8 processor options, from DS8888 48-core to a DS8884 single 6-core. Each system covers a wide range of performance and cost options.
•Memory configurations are available ranging from 64 GB up to 2 TB. The DS8880 family uses POWER8 central processor complex (CPC) unit for each member. The DS8888 uses a model E850C processor complex that runs at greater than twice the performance of a DS8870. The DS8884 by using a model S822 CPC also performs better than the DS8870.
•The DS8880 is available with HPFEs. HPFEs can be installed in the base frame and the first expansion frame. One High-Performance Flash Enclosure (Gen-2) pair can hold 16, 32, or 48 flash drives, with capacities of 400 GB, 800 GB, 1.6 TB, 3.2 TB, and 3.8 TB. With Release 8.3, the number of HPFE Gen-2 enclosure pairs that can be installed is doubled, allowing higher flash capacities with newly shipped machines.
Release 8.3 also enables field upgradeable support for Dynamic Plug Order (DPO), a mechanism for clients to install the second generation of High Performance Flash Enclosures (HPFE Gen-2) to their existing Model 980, 981, and 982 systems. The HPFE Gen-2 enclosure pair is installed into the next available standard storage enclosure pair location for models 980/981. For model 982, the HPFE Gen-2 are installed in designated locations (recommendations and restrictions apply). You can contact IBM to order a field upgrade to upgrade your current 283x models 980,981, and 982.
•The POWER8 simultaneous multithreading (SMT) technology allows analytic data processing clients to achieve up to 2.5 million I/O per second (IOPS) in Database for Open environments (70% read/30% write, 4 KB IOs, 50% read cache hit) with the 384 Flash drives, 2 TB cache, and 48-cores in the DS8888 all-flash.
•The z-Synergy Services include IBM z/OS® licensed features that are supported on the storage system. The licensed features include IBM FICON® attachment for IBM Z, PAV, HyperPAV, SuperPAV, IBM Z High-Performance FICON (zHPF), and z/OS Distributed Data Backup, as well as the option for thinly provisioned CKD volumes.
•The DS8880 offers enhanced connectivity with four-port 16 Gbps and four or eight-port 8 Gbps Fibre Channel/IBM FICON host adapters (HAs). Each host adapter port can be configured independently, based on HA speed:
 – 16 Gbps can use Fibre Channel Protocol (FCP) or FICON protocol.
 – 8 Gbps can use Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL), FCP, or FICON protocol.
Ports that are configured for FCP can be used for mirroring.
•High-Performance FICON for IBM Z (zHPF) is an enhancement to IBM FICON architecture to offload I/O management processing from the IBM Z channel subsystem to the DS8880 HA and controller. zHPF is an optional feature of the IBM Z server and of the DS8880. Recent enhancements to zHPF include Extended Distance Facility zHPF List Pre-fetch support for IBM DB2® and utility operations, and zHPF support for sequential access methods. All DB2 I/O is now zHPF-capable, and now supports the DB2 castout accelerator function that allows the DS8000 to treat a castout as a single chain of IOs.
The 16 Gbps host adapters on the DS8880 and IBM z13® and later IBM Z server channels increase the write throughput by 50% or better. This improvement allows zHPF Extended Distance II to support heavy write I/Os over an extended distance of up to 100 km (62 miles).
•Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe Generation 3) I/O enclosures complement the improved I/O bandwidth that is provided by POWER8. The DS8880 includes new PCIe Gen3-based I/O enclosures. Each I/O enclosure connects to both internal servers over a pair of x8 PCIe Gen3 cables, each of which provides 8 GBps connectivity. An additional pair of PCIe connectors on the I/O enclosure provides connections to HPFEs.
Each pair of I/O enclosures supports up to two pairs of High-Performance Flash Enclosures Gen2. The storage virtualization that is offered by the DS8880 allows organizations to allocate system resources more effectively and better control application quality of service (QoS).
•The Adaptive Multi-stream Prefetching (AMP) caching algorithm can dramatically improve sequential performance, reducing times for backup, processing for business intelligence and streaming media. Sequential Adaptive Replacement Cache is a caching algorithm that allows you to run different workloads, such as sequential and random workloads, without negatively affecting each other. For example, sequential workload does not fill up the cache and does not affect cache hits for random workloads. Intelligent Write Caching (IWC) improves the Cache Algorithm for random writes.
•The DS8880 provides a graphical management interface to configure the DS8880, query status information, and monitor the performance of the DS8880. New for microcode Release 8.3, a new link is now provided for the Service Management GUI.
•Easy Tier is a no-charge feature that enables automatic dynamic data relocation capabilities. Easy Tier optimizes the usage of each tier, especially the use of flash storage. No manual tuning is required. The auto-balancing algorithms also provide benefits when homogeneous storage pools are used to eliminate hot spots on disk arrays.
•Large volume support that allows DS8880 to support logical unit number (LUN) sizes up to 16 TB. This configuration simplifies storage management tasks. In a z/OS environment, extended address volumes (EAVs) with sizes up to 1 TB are supported.
•The DS8880 has an Active Volume Protection feature that prevents the deletion of volumes that are still in use.
•The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) T10 Data Integrity Field (DIF) standard is supported on IBM Z systems for Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) end-to-end data protection on fixed-block architecture (FB) LUN volumes. This support applies to the IBM DS8000. IBM Z system support applies to FCP channels only.
•The Dynamic Volume Expansion simplifies management by enabling easier, online volume expansion (for open systems and IBM Z) to support application data growth, and to support data center migration and consolidation to larger volumes to ease addressing constraints.
•Thin provisioning allows the creation of over-provisioned devices for more efficient usage of the storage capacity for open systems. Extent space-efficient volumes with small extents are now supported. For more information, see IBM DS8880 Thin Provisioning, REDP-5343.
•Quick Initialization provides fast volume initialization for open system LUNs and count key data (CKD) volumes. Quick Initialization allows the creation of devices, making them available when the command completes.
•Full disk encryption (FDE) can protect business-sensitive data by providing disk-based hardware encryption that is combined with external key management software (IBM Security Key Lifecycle Manager or Gemalto SafeNet KeySecure). FDE is available for all rotational disks and flash drives types. Because encryption is performed by the disk drive, it is transparent to host systems and it can be used in any environment, including z/OS.
•The DS8880 enables clients to comply with the Special Publication (SP) number 800-131a. This is a National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) directive that provides guidance for protecting sensitive data by using cryptographic algorithms that have key strengths of 112 bits.
•Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is a feature of the encryption key management process help address payment industry requirements.
•The DS8000 series is certified as meeting the requirements of the IPv6 Ready Logo program. This certification indicates its implementation of IPv6 mandatory core protocols and the ability to interoperate with other IPv6 implementations. The IBM DS8000 can be configured in native IPv6 environments. The logo program provides conformance and interoperability test specifications that are based on open standards to support IPv6 deployment globally. Furthermore, the NIST tested IPv6 with the DS8000, granting it support for the USGv6 profile and testing program.
•Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) authentication support, which allows single sign-on (SSO), can simplify user management by allowing the DS8000 to rely on a centralized LDAP directory rather than a local user repository. LDAP can be enabled through the Copy Services Manager (CSM). New since microcode Release 8.1, the CSM software (previously known as IBM Tivoli® Productivity Center for Replication) is preinstalled on the DS8880 HMC.
•For data protection and availability needs, the DS8880 provides a rich set of point-in-time and remote mirror and copy functions. These functions provide storage mirroring and copying over large distances for disaster recovery or availability purposes. These functions are also fully interoperable with previous models of the DS8000 family.
•Support for IBM i variable LUN adds flexibility for volume sizes. It can increase capacity usage for IBM i environments.
•The DS8880 offers enhanced IBM Z system Synergy items:
 – Forward Error Correction (FEC)
FEC is a protocol that captures errors that are generated during data transmission.
Both the IBM Z system z13 (and later) and the DS8880 extend the use of FEC to complete end-to-end coverage for 16 Gbps links and preserve data integrity with more redundancy.
 – Fibre Channel (FC) Read Diagnostic Parameters (RDP)
FC RDP improves the end-to-end link fault isolation for 16 Gbps links on the IBM Z systems z13 (and later) and the DS8000. RDP data provides the optical signal strength, error counters, and other critical information that is crucial to determine the quality of the link.
 – I/O Priority Manager is a feature that provides application-level QoS for workloads that share a storage pool. This feature provides a way to manage QoS for I/O operations that are associated with critical workloads and gives them priority over other I/O operations that are associated with non-critical workloads. For IBM z/OS, the I/O Priority Manager allows increased interaction with the host side.
 – FICON Dynamic Routing (FIDR)
FIDR is an IBM Z system z13 (and later) and DS8000 feature that supports the use of dynamic routing policies in the fabric switch to balance load across inter-switch links (ISLs) on a per I/O basis.
 – Fabric I/O Priority
Fabric I/O Priority is an end-to-end synergy feature between the z/OS Workload Manager, Brocade SAN Fabric, and the storage system to manage QoS on a single I/O level.
 – IBM zHyperLink
zHyperLink is a new connectivity method that dramatically reduces latency by interconnecting the IBM Z central electronics complexes (CECs) directly to the I/O Bays of the DS8880. Note that zHyperlink is only supported on DS8886F machines (models 985 and 986) with system memory of 256 and 512 GB at the 8.3.1 release, with the initial release supporting read I/O only.
 
Note: For more information about the IBM Z synergy features, see IBM DS8880 and IBM z Systems Synergy, REDP-5186.
1.2 DS8880 controller options and frames
The IBM DS8880 family consists of a series of distinct models:
•DS8888 Model 988 (Base/three-phase power) and Model 88E (Expansion)
This model is also available in an all-flash model: DS8888F.
•DS8886 Model 986 (Base/three-phase power) and Model 86E (Expansion)
This model is also available in an all-flash version: DS8886F.
•DS8886 Model 985 (Base/single-phase power) and Model 85E (Expansion)
This model is also available in an all-flash version: DS8886F.
•DS8884 Model 984 (Base/single-phase power) and Model 84E (Expansion)
This model is also available in an all-flash version: DS8884F.
These systems are part of the 283x (hybrid) and 533x (all-flash) machine type families.
The DS8880 includes the following features:
•IBM POWER8 processor technology
The DS8880 currently features the IBM POWER8 processor-based server technology for high performance. Compared to the IBM POWER7+™ processors that were used in models of the DS8870, IBM POWER8 can deliver at least 2x improvement in IOPS in transaction-processing workload environments.
•Nondisruptive upgrade path
A nondisruptive upgrade path for the DS8880 allows processor, cache, HAs, storage upgrades, and both model 98E and 98B expansion frame upgrades to be installed concurrently without disrupting applications.
•The air-flow system allows optimal horizontal cool down of the storage system. The DS8880 is designed for hot and cold aisle data center design, drawing air for cooling from the front of the system and exhausting hot air at the rear. For more information, see 2.6, “Power and cooling” on page 64.
•The DS8880 offers three system class options:
 – DS8888AF based on POWER8 E850C architecture
 – DS8886AF and DS8886 Hybrid based on POWER8 S824 architecture
 – DS8884AF and DS8884 hybrid based on POWER8 S822 architecture
For more information about the specifics for each model, see 2.3.1, “IBM POWER8-based servers” on page 42.
 
Note: The DS8884 Class configuration cannot be converted into a DS8886 or DS8888 Class configuration.
•High-Performance Flash Enclosure
The HPFE Gen-2 is an enclosure that can support both High Performance flash drives with capacities between 400 GB and 3.2 TB, and High Capacity flash drives of 3.8 TB (2.5-inch form factor), in a 2U rack space. The enclosures need to be installed in pairs. You can install up to 16 HPFE Gen2 pairs in the DS8888 all-flash system, up to 8 HPFE pairs for each DS8886 in a hybrid system, and up to 4 HPFE Gen2 pairs in a DS8884 hybrid system.
•Standard drive enclosures
The DS8880 configurations provide standard drive enclosure support for 24 small form factor (SFF) 2.5-inch (64 mm) drives in 2U of rack space. This option helps improve the storage density for disk drive modules (DDMs) as compared to previous enclosures.
The DS8886 configuration can support 1,536 drives, plus 384 flash drives, in a small, high-density footprint (base frame and up to four expansion frames) that helps to preserve valuable data center floor space with the 19-inch rack 40U extended to 46U.
The DS8884 configuration can support 768 drives, plus 192 flash drives in a small high-density footprint (base frame and up to two expansion frames) that helps to preserve valuable data center floor space with the 19-inch rack 40U.
As an alternative, the DS8886 and the DS8884 also support large form factor (LFF) drive enclosures with twelve 3.5-inch (89 mm) disk drives in 2U of rack space. LFF drive maximums are half of the maximums of the SFF enclosures. SFF and LFF enclosures can be intermixed within the same frame and within a DA pair, although they cannot be intermixed within a drive enclosure pair.
1.3 DS8880 architecture and functions overview
The DS8880 offers continuity with the fundamental architecture of its predecessors, the DS8800 and DS8870 models. This architecture ensures that the DS8880 can use a stable and well-proven operating environment that offers optimal availability. The hardware is optimized to provide higher performance, connectivity, and reliability.
1.3.1 Overall architecture and components
For more information about the available configurations for the DS8880, see Chapter 2, “IBM DS8880 hardware components and architecture” on page 23.
IBM POWER8 processor technology
The POWER8 processor is manufactured by using the IBM 22 nm Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI) technology. Each chip is 649 mm2 and contains 4.2 billion transistors. The DS8880 now uses the PCIe Gen 3 I/O controllers and an interconnection system that connects all components within the chip.
POWER8 processor advancements in multi-core and multithreading are remarkable. These multithreading capabilities improve the I/O throughput of the DS8880 storage server.
The DS8880 family offers several configurations of CPCs:
•The DS8888 offers two processor configurations:
 – 24-core with 1 TB memory
 – 48-core with 2 TB memory
•The DS8886 has three processor configurations:
 – 8-core with 128 and 256 GB memory
 – 16-core with 256 and 512 GB memory
 – 24-core with 1024 and 2048 GB memory
•The DS8884 offers a single processor configuration:
 – 6-core with 64, 128, and 256 GB memory.
A central processor complex is also referred to as a storage server or CPC. For more information, see Chapter 3, “Reliability, availability, and serviceability on the IBM DS8880” on page 73.
Internal PCIe-based fabric
The new I/O enclosure pairs are PCIe Gen3-capable. The new I/O enclosure supports six PCIe adapter slots, two additional direct-attached high-performance flash enclosure ports, and two zHyperlink ports that are new for DS8886 16-core models (256 GB or 512GB memory) with DS8000 microcode Release 8.3. The I/O enclosures are attached to the POWER8 servers by two x8 PCIe Gen3 cables. The internal transfer rate to each I/O bay is four times faster compared to the earlier model.
High-performance flash enclosure
The HPFEs connect to the I/O enclosures over a PCIe fabric, which increases bandwidth and transaction-processing capability. The HPFE Gen-2, which is based on 2.5-inch flash drives now supports two distinct classifications of Flash drive. High Performance and High Capacity (up to 3.2 TB for High Performance and 3.8 TB for High Capacity) and can be installed in models 984, 985, 986, and 988. They can be installed in pairs of 2U enclosures, with each such pair holding up to 48 flash drives. HPFEs and flash drives provide up to a 4x throughput improvement compared to ordinary flash drives.
When comparing both HPFE generations, the Gen2 integrated flash RAID controller delivers significantly increased performance and capacity figures. Each flash adapter pair, and thus each HPFE pair, delivers up to 500K IOPS, and up to 14 GBps and 9.3 GBps for read and write bandwidth respectively.
Device adapters
The DS8880 Standard Drive Enclosures connect to the processor complexes through 8 Gbps four-port Fibre Channel device adapters (DAs). They are optimized for flash drive (SSD) technology and designed for long-term scalability growth. For more information, see Chapter 2, “IBM DS8880 hardware components and architecture” on page 23.
Switched Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop
When connecting to the standard drive enclosures, the DS8880 uses an 8 Gb switched FC-AL architecture to connect the DAs to these enclosures. The DAs connect to the controller cards in the drive enclosures by using FC-AL with optical shortwave multi-mode interconnections. The Fibre Channel interface cards (FCICs) provide point-to-point SAS connections to each drive and DA, providing four paths from the DS8880 processor complexes to each disk drive. For more information, see Chapter 2, “IBM DS8880 hardware components and architecture” on page 23.
Drive options
In addition to flash drives, the DS8880 offers the following disk drives to meet the requirements of various workloads and configurations. For more information, see Chapter 7, “IBM DS8880 physical planning and installation” on page 193.
•400 GB, 800 GB, 1.6 TB, and 3.2 TB drives for High Performance Flash requirements
•3.8 TB drives for High Capacity Flash requirements
•300 and 600 GB 15K revolutions per minute (RPM) enterprise disk drives for high-performance requirements
•600 GB, 1.2 TB, and 1.8 TB 10K RPM disk drives for standard performance requirements
•4 TB and 6 TB 7,200 RPM nearline LFF disk drives for large-capacity requirements
Flash drives provide up to 100 times the throughput and 10 times lower response time than 15K RPM spinning drives. They also use less power than traditional spinning drives. For more information, see Chapter 7, “IBM DS8880 physical planning and installation” on page 193.
All drives including flash drives in the DS8880 are encryption-capable. Enabling encryption is optional. It requires at least two key servers with the IBM Security Key Lifecycle Manager software, or the Gemalto Safenet, OASIS Key Management Interoperability Protocol (KMIP) compatible software.
IBM Easy Tier
Easy Tier enables the DS8880 to automatically balance I/O access to disk drives to avoid hot spots on disk arrays. Easy Tier can place data in the storage tier that best suits the access frequency of the data. Highly accessed data can be moved nondisruptively to a higher tier, for example, to flash drives. Cold data or data that is primarily accessed sequentially is moved to a lower tier (for example, to nearline disks). Easy Tier includes additional components:
•Easy Tier Application is an application-aware storage utility to help deploy storage more efficiently by enabling applications and middleware to direct more optimal placement of the data by communicating important information about current workload activity and application performance requirements. It is possible for DB2 applications in z/OS environments to give hints of data placement to Easy Tier at the data set level.
•Easy Tier Heat Map Transfer (HMT) can take the data placement algorithm on the Metro Mirror/Global Copy/Global Mirror (MM/GC/GM) primary site and reapply it to the MM/GC/GM secondary site when failover occurs by using the Easy Tier Heat Map Transfer Utility (HMTU). With this capability, the DS8000 systems can maintain application-level performance. The Easy Tier HMT functions support Metro/Global Mirror (MGM) to transfer a heat map automatically to a tertiary site.
 
Note: Easy Tier Server has been removed from marketing support. It is replaced with the Flash Cache option of IBM AIX® 7.2.
The following newer Easy Tier controls are available:
•For Easy Tier to function effectively, it needs some free extents in each extent pool to be able to move around extents. A storage administrator can keep an eye on this and make sure that not all capacity is allocated. However, there is a new control to let the system reserve some space for Easy Tier extent movements. The control is available, for example by use of the chsi command specifying -etsrmode enable to enable space reservation for Easy Tier.
•Another new control in microcode Release 8.3 is the allocation policy for new volumes. In previous implementations, new storage was allocated from Tier 1 if available and then from Tier 2, and Tier 0 was not preferred. You can change the allocation policy now according to your needs with the chsi command and the -ettierorder highutil or highperf:
 – The new data allocation order for Hybrid systems can be changed between the High Utilization tiers, ENT → → HighCap → → NL → → HighPerf, or the High Performance tiers, HighPerf → HighCap → ENT → NL.
 – The new data allocation order for All Flash systems can be changed between the High Utilization tiers HighCap → HighPerf or the High Performance Tiers HighPerf → HighCap.
For more information about the Easy Tier features, see the following resources:
•IBM DS8000 EasyTier, REDP-4667
•DS8870 Easy Tier Application, REDP-5014
•IBM DS8870 Easy Tier Heat Map Transfer, REDP-5015
Host adapters
The DS8880 offers 16 Gbps and 8 Gbps Fibre Channel host adapters:
•The 16 Gbps FC adapter has four 16 Gbps-capable ports. Each port independently auto-negotiates to 4, 8, or 16 Gbps link speed, and it can be configured to FCP or FICON.
•The 8 Gbps FC adapter has four or eight 8 Gbps-capable ports. Each port independently auto-negotiates to 2, 4, or 8 Gbps link speed, and it can be configured to FC-AL, FCP, or FICON.
Storage Hardware Management Console for the DS8880
The HMC is the focal point for maintenance activities and contains a version of CSM. The HMC is a dedicated workstation that is physically inside the DS8880. The HMC can proactively monitor the state of your system and notify you and IBM when service is required. It can also be connected to your network to enable centralized management of your system by using the IBM data storage command-line interface (DS CLI). The HMC supports the IPv4 and IPv6 standards. For more information, see Chapter 8, “IBM DS8880 Management Console planning and setup” on page 219.
A second HMC is available as an optional feature. The console can be used as a redundant management console for environments with high availability requirements. It is also in the bottom primary frame, and contains a copy of the CSM that also includes an LDAP proxy server.
Isolated key server
The IBM Security Key Lifecycle Manager software performs key management tasks for IBM encryption-enabled hardware, such as the IBM DS8880. IBM Secure Lifecycle Manager provides, protects, stores, and maintains encryption keys that are used to encrypt information that is written to, and decrypt information that is read from encryption-enabled disks.
The DS8880 ships with FDE drives. To configure a DS8880 to use encryption, at least two IBM key servers are required. An isolated key server with dedicated hardware and non-encrypted storage resources is required. It can be ordered from IBM. For more information, see 7.3.6, “Key manager servers for encryption” on page 214.
Alternatively, starting with DS8000 Release 8.1, customers who need to comply with the KMIP have the possibility to use the Gemalto SafeNet KeySecure as the external key server. For details, see the IBM DS8880 Data-at-rest Encryption, REDP-4500.
1.3.2 Storage capacity
The physical storage capacity for the DS8880 is installed in fixed increments that are called drive sets and flash drive sets. A drive set contains 16 DDMs, all of which have the same capacity and the same rotational speed. Nearline drives are available in half sets (8) or full sets (16) of disk drives or DDMs. Both High Performance and High Capacity flash drives are available in sets of 16.
The available drive options provide industry-class capacity and performance to address a wide range of business requirements. The DS8880 storage arrays can be configured as RAID 6, RAID 10, or RAID 5, depending on the drive type. Note that RAID 6 is now the default and preferred setting for the DS8880. RAID 5 can be configured for drives of less than 1 TB, but this configuration is not recommended and requires a risk acceptance. Drive sizes larger than 1 TB can be configured using RAID 5, but require an RPQ and an internal control switch enabled. RAID10 continues to be an option for all drive types.
1.3.3 Supported environments
The DS8000 offers connectivity support across a broad range of server environments, including IBM Power Systems™, IBM Z, and Lenovo System x servers, servers from Oracle and HPE, non-IBM Intel, and AMD-based servers.
The DS8000 supports over 90 platforms. For the current list of supported platforms, see the DS8000 System Storage Interoperation Center (SSIC) at this website:
This rich support of heterogeneous environments and attachments, with the flexibility to easily partition the DS8000 storage capacity among the attached environments, can help support storage consolidation requirements and dynamic environments.
1.3.4 Configuration flexibility
The DS8000 series uses virtualization techniques to separate the logical view of hosts onto LUNs from the underlying physical layer, providing high configuration flexibility. For more information about virtualization, see Chapter 4, “Virtualization concepts” on page 105.
Dynamic volume expansion
Dynamic volume expansion increases the capacity of open systems and IBM Z volumes, while the volume remains connected to a host system. This capability simplifies data growth by providing volume expansion without taking volumes offline. Certain operating systems do not support a change in volume size. Therefore, a host action is required to detect the change after the volume capacity is increased.
Large LUN and large count key data volume support
You can configure LUNs and volumes to span arrays, allowing for larger LUN sizes of up to 16 TB in open systems. Copy Services are not supported for LUN sizes that are greater than 2 TB.
The maximum CKD volume size is 1,182,006 cylinders (1 TB), which can greatly reduce the number of volumes that are managed. This large CKD volume type is called a 3390 Model A. It is referred to as an extended address volume (EAV).
T10 data integrity field support
The DS8880 supports the T10 DIF standard for FB volumes that are accessed by the FCP channel of Linux on IBM Z and IBM AIX on Power Systems. You can define LUNs with an option to instruct the DS8880 to use the CRC-16 T10 DIF algorithm to store the data. You can also create T10 DIF-capable LUNs. The support for IBM i variable LUNs now adds flexibility for volume sizes and can increase capacity utilization for IBM i environments.
VMware VAAI support
The VAAI feature offloads specific storage operations to disk arrays for greatly improved performance and efficiency. With VAAI, VMware vSphere can perform key operations faster and use less CPU, memory, and storage bandwidth. The DS8880 supports the VAAI primitives ATS, which is also known as Compare and Write for hardware-assisted locking, and Clone Blocks (Extended Copy or XCOPY for hardware-assisted move or cloning). VAAI also supports Write Same, Site Recovery Manager (SRM), vCenter plug-in, and variable LUN size.
IBM DS8000 Storage Replication Adapter
IBM DS8000 Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) is a software add-on that integrates with VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager (SRM) solution and enables SRM to perform failovers together with IBM DS8000 storage systems. The IBM DS8000 SRA extends SRM capabilities and allows it to employ DS8000 replication and mirroring as part of the SRM comprehensive Disaster Recovery Planning (DRP) solution.
OpenStack
The DS8000 supports the OpenStack cloud management software for business-critical private, hybrid, and public cloud deployments. The DS8880 supports features in the OpenStack environment, such as volume replication and volume retype. The current supported release is the OpenStack Newton, but also older versions can be used with the respective IBM Storage Driver software level.
For more information about the DS8870 and OpenStack, see Using IBM DS8870 in an OpenStack Environment, REDP-5220.
RESTful API
With the DS8880 support of RESTful API services, DS8880 clients or cloud administrators can design and implement the DS8880 management applications by using the Representational State Transfer (REST) software architecture.
For more information about the RESTful API, see Exploring the DS8870 RESTful API Implementation, REDP-5187.
Flexible LUN-to-LSS association
With no predefined association of arrays to logical subsystems (LSSs) on the DS8000 series, users can put LUNs or CKD volumes into LSSs and make the best use of the 256 address range, particularly for IBM Z.
Simplified LUN masking
In the new GUI, LUNs are directly mapped to the host, and the user cannot define volume groups. Volume groups still exist on the DS8880 systems, but they are not visible from the GUI because they are created in the background during the assignment of a volume to the host.
Thin-provisioning features
Volumes in the DS8880 can be provisioned as full or thin. When clients plan capacity, they need to consider the number of volumes in the extent pool (or overall storage system) and the degree of over-allocation that is planned for.
These volumes feature enabled over-provisioning capabilities that provide more efficient usage of the storage capacity and reduced storage management requirements. For more information, see Chapter 4, “Virtualization concepts” on page 105. For details, refer toIBM DS8880 Thin Provisioning, REDP-5343.
Maximum values of logical definitions
The DS8000 features the following maximum values for the major logical definitions:
•Up to 256 LSSs
•Up to 65,280 logical devices
•Up to 16 TB LUNs
•Up to 1,182,006 cylinder (1 TB) CKD volumes
•Up to 130,560 FICON logical paths (512 logical paths for each control unit image) on the DS8000
•Up to 1,280 logical paths for each FC port
•Up to 8,192 process logins (509 for each SCSI-FCP port)
1.3.5 Copy Services functions
For IT environments that cannot afford to stop their systems for backups, the DS8880 provides IBM FlashCopy®. This fast replication technique can provide a point-in-time copy of the data in a few seconds or even less. New for microcode Release 8.3 is the ability to perform Cascaded FlashCopies, where the target of a FlashCopy relationship can also be the source of another FlashCopy relationship. For more information, see DS8000 Cascading FlashCopy Design and Scenarios, REDP-5463
 
Note: FlashCopy Space Efficient (based on Track Space Efficient) is not supported by the DS8880. FlashCopy targets based on Extent Space Efficient volumes with small extents are now the alternative for both Open and z/OS. For more information, see IBM DS8880 Thin Provisioning, REDP-5343.
For data protection and availability needs, the DS8880 provides Metro Mirror, Global Mirror, Global Copy, Metro/Global Mirror, and z/OS Global Mirror, which are Remote Mirror and Copy functions. These functions are also available and are fully interoperable with previous models of the DS8000 family. These functions provide storage mirroring and copying over large distances for disaster recovery or availability purposes.
Copy Services scope limiting is the ability to specify policy-based limitations on Copy Services requests.
For more information about Copy Services, see Chapter 5, “DS8000 Copy Services overview” on page 137. You can also see DS8000 Copy Services, SG24-8367.
1.3.6 Service and setup
The installation of the DS8000 is performed by IBM in accordance with the installation procedure for this system. The client’s responsibility is the installation planning, retrieval, and installation of feature activation codes, logical configuration, and execution.
For maintenance and service operations, the storage HMC is the focus. The management console is a dedicated workstation that is physically inside the DS8880 where it can automatically monitor the state of your system. It notifies you and IBM when service is required. Generally, use a dual-HMC configuration, particularly when Full Disk Encryption is used.
The HMC is also the interface for remote services (call home and remote support), which can be configured to meet client requirements. It is possible to allow one or more of the following configurations:
•Call home on error (machine-detected)
•Connection for a few days (client-initiated)
•Remote error investigation (service-initiated)
The remote connection between the management console and the IBM Service organization is performed by using the Assist On-site (AOS) feature. AOS offers more options, such as Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) security and enhanced audit logging. For more information, see IBM Assist On-site for Storage Overview, REDP-4889.
Remote Support Center (rsc) is now also an available option for providing the IBM Service organization remote support access to systems.
The DS8000 storage system can be ordered with an outstanding four-year warranty (an industry first) on hardware and software.
1.3.7 IBM Certified Secure Data Overwrite
IBM Certified Secure Data Overwrite (SDO) is a process that provides a secure overwrite of all data storage in a DS8880 storage system. Before you perform a secure data overwrite, you must remove all of the logical configuration and any encryption groups that can be configured. The process is then initiated by the IBM service support representative (SSR). For more information, see 3.7.3, “Secure Data Overwrite” on page 103.
1.4 Performance features
The DS8880 offers optimally balanced performance. The DS8880 incorporates many performance enhancements, such as a dual multi-core IBM POWER8 processor complex implementation in the DS8886, fast 16 Gbps, and 8 Gbps Fibre Channel/FICON host adapters, HPFE dedicated flash architecture in second generation, classical flash drives, and high-bandwidth, fault-tolerant point-to-point PCI Express Gen-3 internal connections.
With all of these components, the DS8880 is positioned at the top of the high-performance category.
1.4.1 16 Gbps host adapters
The DS8880 supports 16 Gbps host adapters. This connectivity reduces latency and provides faster single stream (12% - 14% improvements for zHPF) and per port throughput. These cards can work also with 8 or 4 Gbps compatibility, with no FC-AL connections. The Lights on Fastload feature avoids path disturbance during code loads on 16 Gbps host adapters.
1.4.2 Sophisticated caching algorithms
IBM Research conducts extensive investigations into improved algorithms for cache management and overall system performance improvements. To implement sophisticated caching algorithms, it is essential to include powerful processors for the cache management. With a 4 KB cache segment size and up to 2 TB overall cache sizes, the tables to maintain the cache segments become large.
Sequential Prefetching in Adaptive Replacement Cache
One of the performance features of the DS8000 is its self-learning cache algorithm, which optimizes cache efficiency and enhances cache hit ratios. This algorithm, which is used in the DS8000 series, is called Sequential Prefetching in Adaptive Replacement Cache (SARC).
SARC provides the following abilities:
•Sophisticated algorithms to determine the data to store in cache that is based on recent access and the frequency needs of the hosts
•Prefetching, which anticipates data before a host request and loads it into cache
•Self-learning algorithms to adaptively and dynamically learn the data to store in cache that is based on the frequency needs of the hosts
Adaptive Multi-stream Prefetching
AMP is a breakthrough caching technology that improves performance for common sequential and batch processing workloads on the DS8000. AMP optimizes cache efficiency by incorporating an autonomic, workload-responsive, and self-optimizing prefetching technology.
Intelligent Write Caching
Intelligent Write Caching (IWC) improves performance through better write-cache management and destaging the order of writes. It minimizes disk actuator movements on writes so that the disks can perform more I/O in total. IWC can also double the throughput for random write workloads. Specifically, database workloads benefit from this new IWC cache algorithm.
SARC, AMP, and IWC play complementary roles. Although SARC is carefully dividing the cache between the RANDOM and the SEQ lists to maximize the overall hit ratio, AMP is managing the contents of the SEQ list to maximize the throughput that is obtained for the sequential workloads. IWC manages the write cache and decides the order and rate to destage to disk.
1.4.3 Flash storage
Today’s installations of new storage systems are mostly either hybrid (multitier) installations, mixing spinning drives and flash drives together in one system. It is sometimes also referred to as a hybrid-flash array (HFA). For clients considering an all-flash strategy, an All-flash array (AFA) can be deployed.
The IBM DS8880 offers the following options:
•The DS8880 can act as a Tier 1 machine, or combine flash and HDDs into a multitier hybrid-flash storage system, with automated algorithms optimizing the tiering and placing hot areas onto flash.
•The DS8880 can hold a large quantity of flash drives (SSDs) to allow an all-flash deployment in larger capacities, thereby already benefitting from the low SSD latency values for each I/O, and having an All-flash array.
•You can also configure the DS8880 with High-Performance Flash Enclosures exclusively, for an all-flash solution or in a hybrid (mixed) configuration.
•New for microcode Release 8.3 is the ability to configure the DS8880 with High-Capacity Flash drives exclusively, for an extremely dense high-performance all-flash array.
To improve data transfer rate (IOPS) and response time, the DS8880 supports flash drives and high-performance flash drives, which are based on NAND technology. With the flash drives and the specific architecture being used in the High-Performance Flash Enclosures, much higher IOPS densities (IOPS/GB) are possible, than with ordinary SSDs.
The flash drive feature improves I/O transaction-based performance over traditional spinning drives in standard drive enclosures. The DS8880 is available with 400 GB, 800 GB, 1.6 TB, 3.2 TB, and 3.8 TB encryption-capable flash drives.
High-performance flash drives use the integrated Flash RAID adapters in the HPFE, and PCI Express connections to the processor complexes. The DS8880 is available with encryption-capable flash drives in capacities from 400 GB to 3.8 TB. All Flash drives types are high-IOPS class enterprise storage devices that are targeted at Tier 0, I/O-intensive workload applications that can use a high level of fast-access storage. Flash drives offer many potential benefits over rotational drives, including better IOPS, lower power consumption, less heat generation, and lower acoustical noise. For more information, see Chapter 7, “IBM DS8880 physical planning and installation” on page 193.
1.4.4 Performance for IBM Z systems
The DS8000 series supports the following IBM performance enhancements for IBM Z environments:
•PAVs enable a single IBM Z server to simultaneously process multiple I/O operations to the same logical volume, which can significantly reduce device queue delays. This reduction is achieved by defining multiple addresses for each volume. With Dynamic PAV, the assignment of addresses to volumes can be automatically managed to help the workload meet its performance objectives and reduce overall queuing.
•HyperPAV is designed to enable applications to achieve equal or better performance than with PAV alone, while also using fewer unit control blocks (UCBs) and eliminating the latency in targeting an alias to a base. With HyperPAV, the system can react immediately to changing I/O workloads.
•New since DS8880 release 8.1, SuperPAV allows z/OS to use an alias address from another LCU.
•Multiple Allegiance expands the simultaneous logical volume access capability across multiple IBM Z systems. This function, with PAV, enables the DS8000 to process more I/Os in parallel, which improves performance and enables greater use of large volumes.
•I/O priority queuing allows the DS8000 series to use I/O priority information that is provided by the z/OS Workload Manager to manage the processing sequence of I/O operations at the adapter level.
•I/O Priority Manager provides application-level QoS for workloads that share a storage pool. It provides a way to manage QoS for I/O operations of critical workloads and gives them priority over other I/O operations that are associated with non-critical workloads. For z/OS, the I/O Priority Manager allows increased interaction with the host side (zWLM integration).
•zHPF reduces the effect that is associated with supported commands on current adapter hardware. This configuration improves FICON throughput on the DS8000 I/O ports. The DS8000s also supports the new zHPF I/O commands for multi-track I/O operations, DB2 list-prefetch, sequential access methods, and DB2 castout acceleration.
•zHyperwrite is another enhancement for DB2 clients. In a z/OS Metro Mirror environment, it enables DB2 log updates to be written to the primary and secondary volumes in parallel. This configuration reduces the latency for log writes, and so improving transactional response times and log throughput. The Metro Mirror primary volume needs to be enabled with IBM HyperSwap® by either IBM Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex™ (IBM GDPS®) or CSM.
•zHyperLink provides a connectivity method that dramatically reduces latency by interconnecting the IBM Z system directly to the I/O Bay of the DS8880. The zHyperlink functionality requires DS8000 LMC 8.8.31.xx.xx, bundle version 88.31.xxx.xx, or later, with the initial release supporting read I/O only. It is supported on DS8886 16-core models, with 256 GB or 512 GB of memory).
For more information about performance on IBM Z systems, see IBM DS8880 and IBM z Systems Synergy, REDP-5186.
1.4.5 Performance enhancements for IBM Power Systems
Many IBM Power Systems users can benefit from the following DS8000 features:
•End-to-End I/O priorities
•Cooperative caching
•Long busy wait host tolerance
•Automatic port queues
For more information about performance enhancements, see Chapter 6, “Designed for performance” on page 159.
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