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First issue with Hyper-V and DP


aprib

Question

My setup is a notebook with 2 drives, with 2 partitions in a DP file-replication pool, windows 8.1 with Hyper-V.

 

I remember reading in another post somewhere that for always-on VMs, DP's balancing algorithm will choke up (or something will happen), if we don't turn off the VM prior to the running of the balancer.

 

And I think that's exactly what happened this morning at 6am when the balancer was scheduled to run on a pool with a running VM. I have not tested turning the VM off to see if the error shows up at balancing, I will try this next.

 

What do you suggest I do for 24/7 VM's. Does anyone has a best practices tips for running virtual machines in a DP pool.

 

 

jmravke.png

 

 

JyyDqJm.png

 

 

ps. I think you've got something special here and I've purchased DP anyway even though I'm only 1 day in my trial. Keep up the good work.

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I scheduled the balancer to run while the VM was off and there was no error. So it seems that the balancer leads to the error in a pool with a running VM.

 

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I tried starting the VM while the balancer was running and got this message.

 

xfqO5AS.png

 

I'm not sure what the balancer does behind the scenes but it took the balancer about 15 mins to complete a run on a pool with 50gb of data.

 

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Update 1: It looks like the balancer modules are running one by one in series. Around about 20 minutes into the balancer scheduled start, I can start the VM. Now at minute 35, again the VM file is locked. 

 

Update 2: Minute 40 VM starts, at minute 50 it locks again.

 

Update 3: Minute 90 after balancer starts, VM still intermittently locks. Does it take the balancer this long to do whatever it does in a 50GB partition.

 

 

CC2xIgO.png

 

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I am starting to feel that DP is not suited for use by a 24/7 Virtual Machine. I can easily schedule a VM to stop prior to balancing but when do I schedule the VM to start again? As the contents of the pool grows bigger I assume the time it takes the balancer to run will also increase.

 

Now I'm curious how storage spaces' balancing algorithm handle their workload, you're both using the same 'kernel' (if that's the right word), there can't be too many different ways of going about it.

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There was an issue with the way that HyperV locked the files, that caused issues with DrivePool, and vice versa.

 

Please download the 2.1.0.503 Beta, as the issue should be fixed in that version.

https://stablebit.com/DrivePool/Download

 

 

And thank you for supporting out products!

We give support regardless of licensing status, but thanks!

 

If you have any issues after updating, then let us know and we'll see what we can do.

 

 

 

As for balancing/duplication, if you have real time duplciation enabled (default), then the files are written to both disks in parallel. And this should respect the balancing options.

And no, we don't use the same method as Storage Spaces. Storage Spaces uses a block based system, that sits below the file system. We sit on top of it, basically. So it's handled a lot differently.

Also, if you click on "Pool Options", there is a "Balancing" section, where you can control the balancing to a degree.

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Thank you for the response.

 

Is there a more detailed article I can read somewhere that explains the finer and more advanced settings of DP, for example what each balancer does, case scenarios explaining why and when you might want to disable/enable a balancer.

 

Since you have given us the option to enable or disable a particular balancer, I am assuming there are scenarios where you envision it should be disabled, and I'm curious what they might be and why.

 

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When you say this,

 

"As for balancing/duplication, if you have real time duplication enabled (default), then the files are written to both disks in parallel. And this should respect the balancing options."

 

.... am I understanding things correctly that when I create a pool from 2 empty drives (with file duplication where everything is duplicated without exception), with real time duplication enabled, every input to the pool will always be balanced/duplicated to both disks at any and every point in time, so I don't really have to enable balancing at all.

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All the balancer options are well, in the Balancer settings page.  Open the UI, find the "Pool Options" button/menu thing (underneath the pie chart) and select "Balancers".

This lets you specify when they're triggered. And then there is the "balancers" tab, that lets you select which balancers are enabled, which order they're assigned, and you can definitely disable them.

 

As for advanced options:

http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_2.x_Advanced_Settings

That includes instructions on how to configure the option, as well a brief descriptions on what each setting does.

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