After completing this course, you should be able to:

• Explain positioning, benefits, and features of the HPE MSA family of products
• Implement HPE MSA virtual storage provisioning
• Navigate and utilize the HPE MSA Storage Management Utility (SMU)
• Use HPE MSA virtualized storage features
• Execute operations via the HPE MSA command line interface (CLI)
• Perform maintenance and support tasks on MSA systems

Module 0: Course Overview

• Learning objectives
• Introductions
• Course prerequisites
• Agenda

Module 1: MSA Family Product Overview

• List the current HPE MSA array generations and models
• Explain the use cases for implementing HPE MSA storage solution
• Describe the controller architecture and features that are included with HPE MSA
• Categorize the various HPE MSA controller models and list their supported configurations
• Identify the connectivity options for various MSA controllers

Module 2: MSA Virtual Storage

• Explain the management/monitoring capabilities built-in to the Storage Management Utility (SMU) version 3 and version 4
• Discuss MSA virtual storage terminology that is part of storage provisioning
  • Page
  • Disk group
  • Tier
  • Pool
  • Read cache
• Recall the benefits of MSA-DP+ RAID
• Describe MSA virtual storage automated tiering mechanism
• Implement MSA virtual storage tier affinity

Module 3: Data Protection on MSA Storage

• Explain how MSA fault tolerance is implemented for disk or controller failures
• Discuss the MSA snapshot feature and illustrate the Redirect on Write (RoW) mechanism
• Explain the volume copy feature and its implementation specifics
• List the capabilities that are available through the MSA Remote Snapshot Replication feature

Module 4: MSA Maintenance and Support

• Describe the maintenance tasks to be performed on disk groups and volumes
• List the ways to track activities and monitor the health status of the MSA
• Explain the procedure to save log files for troubleshooting complex issues1
• Get the URL for the MSA Health Check tool
• Discuss the options to set up notifications from MSA
• Explain the firmware update process on MSA

Lab 0: Accessing the Lab Environment

Lab 1: Configure MSA Virtual Storage with SMU v3

• Task 1: Verify the management IP address of the HPE MSA storage systems
• Task 2: Launch HPE Storage Management Utility (SMU) v3
• Task 3: Create disk groups using SMU v3
• Task 4: Create volumes and map to hosts using SMU v3
• Task 5: Install MPIO and initialize the disks in Windows Disk Management
• Task 6: Map volumes to iSCSI hosts

Lab 2: Configure MSA Virtual Storage with SMU v4

• Task 1: Initialize the MSA Gen6 via Out of Box Experience(OOBE)
• Task 2: Storage Management Utility (SMU) V4
• Task 3: Configure pools and disk groups in SMU v4
• Task 4: Provision volumes and attach to hosts in SMU v4

Lab 3: Data Protection

• Task 1: Create snapshots for data protection using SMU v3
• Task 2: Use snapshots for data recovery in SMU v3
• Task 3: Create snapshots for data protection using SMU v4
• Task 4: Use snapshots for data recovery in SMU v4
• Task 5: Copy volumes or snapshots for data protection

Lab 4: MSA Maintenance and Support

• Task 1: General system health and event logs
• Task 2: Set up alert notifications
• Task 3: Download system logs for troubleshooting
• Task 4: Perform a firmware upgrade

HPE MSA customers (current or potential)

• Basic knowledge of Storage Area Networks (SAN) is recommended.
• Familiarity with Microsoft Windows Server 2012 or higher is an added benefit.