Lenovo Distributed Storage Solution for IBM Storage Scale (DSS-G) on ThinkSystem V3

Lenovo Distributed Storage Solution for IBM Storage Scale (DSS-G) is a software-defined storage (SDS) solution for dense scalable file and object storage suitable for high-performance and data-intensive environments. Enterprises or organizations running HPC, AI, Big Data or cloud workloads will benefit the most from the DSS-G implementation.

DSS-G combines the performance of Lenovo ThinkSystem SR655 V3 2U servers with an AMD EPYC 9004 Series processor, Lenovo storage enclosures, and industry leading IBM Storage Scale software, to offer a high performance, scalable building block approach to modern storage needs.

Lenovo DSS-G is delivered as a pre-integrated, easy-to-deploy rack-level engineered solution that dramatically reduces time-to-value and total cost of ownership (TCO). The solution is built on Lenovo ThinkSystem SR655 V3 servers, Lenovo Storage D1224 Drive Enclosures with high-performance 2.5-inch SAS SSDs, and Lenovo Storage D4390 High-Density Drive Enclosures with large capacity 3.5-inch NL SAS HDDs.

Combined with IBM Storage Scale (formerly IBM Spectrum Scale or General Parallel File System, GPFS), an industry leader in high-performance clustered file system, you have an ideal solution for the ultimate file storage solution for HPC, AI& Big Data.

DSS-G with ThinkSystem V3 is more than doubling the performance over the previous generation and supports up to 25% more capacity in a single building block.

Lenovo DSS-G can be licensed by the number of drives installed or alternatively the usable capacity, rather than the number of processor cores or the number of connected clients, so there are no added licenses for other servers or clients that mount and work with the file system.

Lenovo DSS-G with storage enclosures supports online enclosure expansion. This enables a customer to grow the number of enclosures in an existing DSS-G building block without bringing down the file system, maximizing flexibility to scale storage capacity based on need.

With available Lenovo Premier Support Services, Lenovo provides a single point of entry for supporting the entire DSS-G solution, including the IBM Storage Scale software, for quicker problem determination and minimized downtime.

DSS-G with ThinkSystem V3 servers has the following differences as compared to DSS-G with ThinkSystem V2 servers:

• Servers are SR655 V3
• New DSS-G models - All configs now include:
  • SR655 V3 servers
  • D4390 & D1224 drive enclosures

DSS-G has the following key software features:

• IBM Storage Scale
• Storage Scale RAID on Data Access and Data Management Edition
• DSS-G Call Home

IBM Storage Scale

IBM Storage Scale, based on IBM General Parallel File System (GPFS) technology, is a high-performance and highly scalable parallel file system with an extensive suite of enterprise class data management features. IBM Storage Scale was previously known as IBM Spectrum Scale.

Lenovo is a strategic alliance partner of IBM, and combines IBM Storage Scale software with Lenovo servers, storage and networking components for integrated and customized solutions.

IBM Storage Scale offers access to a single file system or set of filesystems from multiple nodes that can be SAN-attached, network attached or a mix of both or even in a shared nothing cluster configuration. It provides a global namespace, shared file system access among IBM Storage Scale clusters, simultaneous file access from multiple nodes, high recoverability and data availability through replication, the ability to make changes while a file system is mounted, and simplified administration even in large environments. When integrated as part of the Lenovo DSS-G system, the Storage Scale Native RAID code (GNR) is used to provide a fully software defined IBM Storage Scale solution.

Lenovo DSS-G supports two editions of IBM Storage Scale:

• IBM Storage Scale Data Access Edition (DAE) provides base GPFS functions including Information Lifecycle Management (ILM), Active File Management (AFM), and Clustered NFS (CNFS) in Linux environments.
• IBM Storage Scale Data Management Edition (DME) provides all the features of the Data Access Edition plus advanced features like asynchronous multi-site disaster recovery, native encryption support, Transparent Cloud Tiering.

Information about licensing is in the IBM Storage Scale licensing section.

For more information about IBM Storage Scale, see the following web pages:

• IBM Storage Scale product page:
  https://www.ibm.com/products/scale-out-file-and-object-storage
• IBM Storage Scale FAQ:
  https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/en/STXKQY/gpfsclustersfaq.html

Storage Scale RAID on Data Access and Data Management Edition

IBM Storage Scale RAID (also known as GNR) integrates the functionality of an advanced storage controller into the GPFS NSD server. Unlike an external storage controller, where configuration, LUN definition, and maintenance are beyond the control of IBM Storage Scale, IBM Storage Scale RAID itself takes on the role of controlling, managing, and maintaining physical disks - hard disk drives (HDDs) and solid-state drives (SSDs).

Sophisticated data placement and error correction algorithms deliver high levels of storage reliability, availability, serviceability, and performance. IBM Storage Scale RAID provides a variation of the GPFS network shared disk (NSD) called a virtual disk, or vdisk. Standard NSD clients transparently access the vdisk NSDs of a file system using the conventional NSD protocol.

The features of IBM Storage Scale RAID include:

• Software RAID

  IBM Storage Scale RAID, which runs on standard Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) disks in a dual-ported JBOD array, does not require external RAID storage controllers or other custom hardware RAID acceleration.

• Declustering

  IBM Storage Scale RAID distributes client data, redundancy information, and spare space uniformly across all disks of a JBOD. This approach reduces the rebuild (disk failure recovery process) overhead and improves application performance compared to conventional RAID.

• Pdisk-group fault tolerance

  In addition to declustering data across disks, IBM Storage Scale RAID can place data and parity information to protect against groups of disks that, based on characteristics of a disk enclosure and system, could possibly fail together due to a common fault. The data placement algorithm ensures that even if all members of a disk group fail, the error correction codes will still be capable of recovering damaged data.

• Checksum

  An end-to-end data integrity check, using checksums and version numbers, is maintained between the disk surface and NSD clients. The checksum algorithm uses version numbers to detect silent data corruption and lost disk writes.

• Data redundancy

  IBM Storage Scale RAID supports highly reliable 2-fault-tolerant and 3-fault-tolerant Reed-Solomon-based parity codes and 3-way and 4-way replication.

• Large cache

  A large cache improves read and write performance, particularly for small I/O operations.

• Arbitrarily-sized disk arrays

  The number of disks is not restricted to a multiple of the RAID redundancy code width, which allows flexibility in the number of disks in the RAID array.

• Multiple redundancy schemes

  One disk array can support vdisks with different redundancy schemes, for example Reed-Solomon and replication codes.

• Disk hospital

  A disk hospital asynchronously diagnoses faulty disks and paths, and requests replacement of disks by using past health records.

• Automatic recovery

  Seamlessly and automatically recovers from primary server failure.

• Disk scrubbing

  A disk scrubber automatically detects and repairs latent sector errors in the background.

• Familiar interface

  Standard IBM Storage Scale command syntax is used for all configuration commands, including maintaining and replacing failed disks.

• Flexible hardware configuration

  Support of JBOD enclosures with multiple disks physically mounted together on removable carriers.

• Journaling

  For improved performance and recovery after a node failure, internal configuration and small-write data are journaled to solid-state disks (SSDs) in the JBOD or to non-volatile random-access memory (NVRAM) that is internal to the IBM Storage Scale RAID servers.

For more information about IBM Storage Scale RAID see the following documents:

• Introducing IBM Storage Scale RAID
• Lenovo DSS-G Declustered RAID Technology and Rebuild Performance

DSS-G Call Home

Call Home provides DSS-G customers with functionality to simplify and accelerate the resolution of support tickets related to hardware issues at no additional charge. Call Home leverages the mmhealth command from IBM Storage Scale to provide status when hardware components are recognized as “degraded”: disk drives, SAS cables, IOMs, and more. Another script packages this data in a bundle fully ready for support triage (either IBM L1 support, or Lenovo L1 support for customers leveraging Premier Support for DSS-G). As an optional add-on, Call Home can then be enabled to automatically route the ticket to support without any administrator intervention.

The DSS-G call home feature is currently enabled as a Technology Preview. Contact the HPC Storage team at HPCstorage@lenovo.com for further information, or contact Lenovo Managed Services and open a support ticket.

Lenovo DSS-G is fulfilled through Lenovo EveryScale (formerly Lenovo Scalable Infrastructure, LeSI), which offers a flexible framework for the development, configuration, build, delivery and support of engineered and integrated data center solutions. Lenovo thoroughly tests and optimizes all EveryScale components for reliability, interoperability and maximum performance, so clients can quickly deploy the system and get to work achieving their business goals.

The major hardware components of a DSS-G solution are:

• 2x ThinkSystem SR655 V3 servers
• Choice of direct-attach storage enclosures - D1224 and or D4390 enclosures
  • 1x-4x Lenovo Storage D1224 Drive Enclosures each holding 24x 2.5-inch SSDs (small form factor configuration DSS-G20x)
  • 1x-8x Lenovo Storage D4390 External High Density Drive Expansion Enclosure, each holding 90x 3.5-inch HDDs (large form factor configuration DSS-G2x0)
  • 1x-2x D1224 Enclosure plus 1x-7x D4390 Enclosure (max 8x enclosures total, hybrid configuration DSS-G2xx)

Topics in this section:

• Lenovo ThinkSystem SR655 V3 server
• Lenovo Storage D1224 Drive Enclosures
• Lenovo Storage D4390 External Drive Expansion Enclosure
• Infrastructure and rack installation

Key features

Combining performance and flexibility, the SR655 V3 server is a great choice for enterprises of all sizes. The server offers a broad selection of drive and slot configurations and offers high performance features that industries such as finance, healthcare and telco need. Outstanding reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) and high-efficiency design can improve your business environment and can help save operational costs.

Scalability and performance

The following key features boost performance, improve scalability and reduce costs for the Lenovo DSS-G solution: 

• Supports one fourth-generation AMD EPYC 9004 processor
  • Up to 128 cores and 256 threads
  • Core speed of up to 4.1 GHz
  • TDP rating of up to 360W
  • In the Lenovo DSS-G solution, the CPU is pre-selected based on Lenovo performance optimisation
• Support for DDR5 memory DIMMs to maximize the performance of the memory subsystem:
  • 12 DDR5 memory DIMMs
  • 12 memory channels (1 DIMM per channel)
  • DIMM speeds up to 4800 MHz
  • Using 128GB 3DS RDIMMs, the server supports up to 1.5TB of system memory
  • In the Lenovo DSS-G solution, the memory sizing is a function of capacity of the solution
• Supports high-speed RAID controllers from Lenovo and Broadcom providing 24Gb & 12Gb SAS connectivity to the drive backplanes. A variety of PCIe 3.0 and PCIe 4.0 RAID adapters are available.
• Up to 10x total PCIe slots (either 10x rear, or 6x rear + 2x front), plus a slot dedicated to the OCP adapter (rear or front). 2.5-inch drive configurations also support an additional internal bay for a cabled RAID adapter or HBA. In the Lenovo DSS-G solution, 6x x16 PCIe slots are available in each IO Server.
• The server has a dedicated industry standard OCP 3.0 small form factor (SFF) slot, with a PCIe 4.0 x16 interface, supporting a variety of Ethernet network adapters. Simple-swap mechanism with thumbscrews and pull-tab enables tool-less installation and removal of the adapter. Supports shared BMC network sideband connectivity to enable out-of-band systems management.
• The server offers PCI Express 5.0 (PCIe Gen 5) I/O expansion capabilities that doubles the theoretical maximum bandwidth of PCIe 4.0 (32GT/s in each direction for PCIe 5.0, compared to 16 GT/s with PCIe 4.0). A PCIe 5.0 x16 slot provides 128 GB/s bandwidth, enough to support a 400GbE network connection.

For more information about the SR655 V3, see the Product Guide:
https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1610-thinksystem-sr655-v3-server

Lenovo Storage D1224 Drive Enclosures have the following key features:

• 2U rack mount enclosure with 12 Gbps SAS direct-attached storage connectivity, designed to provide simplicity, speed, scalability, security, and high availability
• Holds 24x 2.5-inch small form factor (SFF) drives
• Dual Environmental Service Module (ESM) configurations for high availability and performance
• Flexibility in storing data on high performance SAS SSDs, performance-optimized enterprise SAS HDDs, or capacity-optimized enterprise NL SAS HDDs; mixing and matching drive types and form factors on a single RAID adapter or HBA to perfectly meet performance and capacity requirements for various workloads
• Support multiple host attachments and SAS zoning for storage partitioning

For more information about the Lenovo Storage D1224 Drive Enclosure, see the Lenovo Press product guide:
https://lenovopress.com/lp0512

When integrated as part of a Lenovo DSS-G system, the D1224 enclosure is only supported with SAS SSDs installed and without SAS zoning. The D1224 can be supplied both as a SAS SSD only solution or as part of a hybrid configuring with D4390 based HDD.

Lenovo Storage D4390 External Drive Expansion Enclosure

Figure 4. D4390 High Density Expansion Enclosure

The Lenovo ThinkSystem D4390 Direct Attached Storage Enclosure offers 24 Gbps SAS direct-attached drive-rich storage expansion capabilities that are designed to provide density, speed, scalability, security, and high availability for high-capacity application. The D4390 delivers enterprise-class storage technology in a cost-effective dense solution with flexible drive configurations of up to 90 drives in 4U rack space.

Key features

Key features and benefits provided by the Lenovo ThinkSystem D4390 include:

• Versatile, scalable storage expansion with dual Electronic Service Module (ESM) configurations for high availability and performance
• Flexible host connectivity to match diverse client needs for direct attach storage with support. Users are able to use either 24Gb SAS or 12 Gb SAS RAID adapters for advanced data protection.
• Support 90x 3.5-inch large form factor (LFF) 24Gb Nearline SAS drives in a 4U rack space
• Scalability of up to 180 drives per HBA with the attachment of up to two D4390 daisy-chained high density expansion enclosures
• Flexibility in storing data on high performance SAS SSDs or capacity-optimized enterprise NL SAS HDDs; mixing and matching drive types on a single HBA to perfectly meet performance and capacity requirements for various workloads

The D4390 Direct Attached Storage Enclosure is designed to support a wide range of data storage requirements, from highly utilized applications to high-capacity, low usage applications.

The following SAS drives are supported by the D4390:

• High-capacity, archival-class nearline HDDs, up to 22 TB 7.2K rpm
• High performance SSDs (2.5" drive in 3.5" tray): 800 GB

Additional drives and expansion units are designed to be dynamically added with virtually no downtime (operating system dependent), helping to quickly and seamlessly respond to growing capacity demands.

The D4390 Direct Attached Storage Enclosure is designed to offer high levels of system and data availability with the following technologies:

• Dual ESMs provide redundant paths from a supported HBA to the drives in the enclosures for I/O load balancing and failover
• Dual-port drives (both HDDs and SSDs)
• Redundant hardware, including host ports, ESMs, power supplies, 5V DC/DC regulators and cooling fans
• Hot-swappable and customer replaceable components; including ESMs, power supplies, cooling fans, 5V DC/DC modules, and drives

For more information, see the D4390 product guide:
https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1681-lenovo-storage-thinksystem-d4390-high-density-expansion-enclosure

Unlike the previous DSS-G storage JBOD (D3284), there are no separate drive drawers. A cable management arm is installed on the rear of the enclosure to enable the enclosure to be pulled out for drive service without impacting operation of the DSS-G system. The D4390 enclosure includes an ingenious drive access solution with sliding top-panel so that only the row of drives to be services is exposed, this design helps to maintain air-flow through the system during maintenance and supports improved maintenance times.

Infrastructure and rack installation

The solution arrives at the customer location installed in the Lenovo 1410 Rack, tested, components and cables labeled and ready to deploy for quick productivity.

• Factory-integrated, pre-configured ready-to-go solution that is delivered in a rack with all the hardware you need for your workloads: servers, storage, and network switches, plus essential software tools.
• Pre integrated high performance managed PDUs.
• IBM Storage Scale software is preinstalled on all servers.
• Optional NVIDIA Networking SN2201 Gigabit Ethernet switch for system management.
• Optional Lenovo ThinkSystem SR635 V3 server to run the Lenovo Confluent cluster administration software and to optionally act as the Storage Scale quorum. One Lenovo Confluent management system is required for a DSS-G deployment, however the management server may be shared across HPC cluster and DSS-G building blocks.
• Designed for effortless integration into existing infrastructures, thereby reducing deployment time and saving money.
• Lenovo deployment services are available with the solution help get customers up and running quickly by allowing to begin deploying workloads in hours — not weeks — and realize substantial savings.
• Available NVIDIA Ethernet switches for a high speed Ethernet DSS-G deployments that provide exceptional performance and low latency, along with cost savings, and are designed to perform seamlessly with other vendors' upstream switches.
• All the components of the solution are available through Lenovo, which provides a single point of entry for all support issues that you might encounter with the server, networking, storage, and software used in the solution, for quicker problem determination and minimized downtime.
• Optional Lenovo Rear Door Heat Exchanger can be installed on the rear of the rack.

In addition to the Lenovo 1410 rack solution, the Lenovo DSS-G can also be supplied for installation into an existing customer rack (called a rackless 7X74 solution). When supplied for installation into existing racks, the DSS-G system is factory integrated and tested in the same manner as a fully racked solution but is shipped to the customer is traditional boxed packaging. Lenovo services or business partner services can be used to install into the customer rack or the customer can undertake their own rack installation. Where a customer supplied rack is used, the customer is responsible for ensuring compatibility with the Lenovo components including, but not limited to, depth and fit of enclosure rails and weight loading.

This section lists the system specifications of the components used in the Lenovo DSS-G offerings.

• SR655 V3 specifications
• D4390 LFF storage enclosure specifications
• D1224 SFF storage enclosure specifications
• Rack cabinet specifications
• Optional management components

SR655 V3 specifications

The specifications of the SR655 V3 server are listed in the following table.

D4390 LFF storage enclosure specifications

The following table lists the D4390 standard system specifications.

D1224 SFF storage enclosure specifications

The following table lists the D1224 specifications.

Rack cabinet specifications

The DSS-G can be pre-installed and shipped in a 42U or 48U Lenovo EveryScale Heavy Duty Rack Cabinet. The specifications of the rack are in the following table.

Lenovo DSS-G is available in the configurations listed in the following table. Each configuration is installed in a 42U rack, although multiple DSS-G configurations can share the same rack.

* Capacity is based on using 15.36 TB 2.5-inch SSDs.
** Capacity is based on using 22TB 3.5-inch HDDs in all but 2 of the drive bays in the first drive enclosure; the remaining 2 bays must have 2x SSDs for Storage Scale internal use.
† These models are a hybrid configuration that combines HDDs and SSDs in one building block. The number of drives and capacities are given in terms of HDD and SSD count.

Configurations are built using the x-config configurator tool:
https://lesc.lenovo.com/products/hardware/configurator/worldwide/bhui/asit/index.html

The configuration process includes the following steps:

1. Select the drive and drive enclosure, as listed in the previous table.
2. Node configuration, as described in the next subsections:
   • Memory
   • Network adapter
   • Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) premium subscription
   • Enterprise Software Support (ESS) subscription
3. Confluent management network selection
4. IBM Storage Scale license selection
5. Power distribution infrastructure selection
6. Professional Services selection

The following sections provide information about these configuration steps.

When installed into a customer rack, additional PDUs may be required depending on the orientation they are to be installed into a rack. Refer to the Lenovo 1U Switched & Monitored 3-Phase PDUs product guide for more information on preferred orientation of Lenovo rack PDUs:
https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1556-lenovo-1u-switched-monitored-3-phase-pdu

All drives used in all the enclosures in a DSS-G configuration are identical. The only exception to this is a pair of 800 GB SSDs that are required in the first drive enclosure for any configuration using HDDs. These SSDs are for logtip use by the IBM Storage Scale software and are not for user data.

The drive requirement are as follows:

• For configurations that use HDDs (D4390 only), two 800GB logtip SSDs must also be selected in the first drive enclosure in the DSS-G configuration.
• All subsequent enclosures in HDD-based DSS-G configuration do not require these logtip SSDs.
• Configurations using SSDs do not require the pair of logtip SSDs.
• Only one drive size & type is selectable per DSS-G configuration.
• All drive enclosures must be fully populated with drives. Partially filled enclosures are not supported.

The following table lists the drives available for selection in a D1224 enclosure. D1224 configurations are all SSDs and do not require separate logtip drives.

The following table lists the drives available for selection in a D4390 enclosure.

D4390 configurations are all HDDs, as follows:

• First D4390 enclosure in a configuration: 88 HDDs + 2x 800GB SSDs (BT4S)
• Subsequent D4390 enclosures in a configuration: 90x HDDs

The Lenovo DSS-G configurations described in this product guide use the ThinkSystem SR655 server, which features the AMD Family processors. Details about the configurations are in the Specifications section.

• SR655 V3 memory
• SR655 V3 internal storage
• SR655 V3 SAS HBAs
• SR655 V3 network adapter

SR655 V3 memory

The DSS-G offerings allow three different memory configurations for the SR655 V3 servers

• 384 GB using 12x 32 GB TruDDR5 RDIMMs (1 DIMM per memory channel)
• 768 GB using 12x 64 GB TruDDR5 RDIMMs (1 DIMM per memory channel)
• 1536 GB using 12x 128 GB TruDDR5 RDIMMs (1 DIMM per memory channel)

The following tables indicates memory requirements on the DSS-G configurations containing D4390 enclosures for different drive capacities. This table assumes a 16MB block size and RAID level of 8+2P. If your use configuration deviates from these parameters, please check with your Lenovo sales representative for the required memory.

Use of smaller block sizes on the DSS-G systems will require more memory. When selecting memory sizing, it is not always best to go larger than required – the 128GB DIMMs are both more expensive and 4 rank which can impact memory performance.

Future larger drive capacities may require different memory configurations. The Lenovo configurator will automatically scale memory based on the selection of file system block size, drive capacity and drive count.

The following table lists the memory options that are available for selection.

SR655 V3 internal storage

The SR655 V3 servers have two internal hot-swap drives, configured as a RAID-1 pair and connected to a RAID 930-8i adapter with 2GB of flash-backed cache.

SR655 V3 SAS HBAs

The SR655 V3 servers use SAS HBAs to connect the external D4390 or D1224 JBODs. The system is required to have 4 HBAs per server. It is not supported to change the SAS HBAs in the DSS-G solution. The PCIe slots used for the DSS-G solution are fixed and the location of the adapters should not be changed.

SR655 V3 network adapter

The following table lists the adapters that are available for use for cluster fabric.

For details about these adapters, see the Mellanox ConnectX-7 Adapter product guides:

• NDR400 adapter:
  https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1692-thinksystem-nvidia-connectx-7-ndr-infiniband-osfp400-adapters
• NDR200 adapter
  https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1693-thinksystem-nvidia-connectx-7-ndr200-infiniband-qsfp112-adapters

The dual-port NDR200 adapter can be used in either Ethernet mode or InfiniBand mode.

The transceivers and optical cables, or the DAC cables needed to connect the adapters to the customer-supplied network switches can be configured together with the system in x-config. Consult the Product Guides for the adapters for details.

The following table lists the OCP LOM modules that are available for use for deployment/OS network.

DSS-G supported network adapters are required in slots 1 and 7, and the SAS adapters are always located in slots 2, 4, 5, and 8, as shown in the following figure.

Figure 6. SR655 V3 slot allocation

The Lenovo DSS-G offering connects as a storage block to the customer's Storage Scale cluster network using the high-speed network adapters installed in the servers. Each pair of servers has two or three network adapters, which are either Ethernet or InfiniBand. Each DSS-G storage block connects to the cluster network.

In concert with the cluster network is the Confluent management network. In lieu of a customer-supplied management network, the Lenovo DSS-G offering includes a ThinkSystem SR635 V3 server running Confluent and a NVIDIA Networking SN2201 48-port Gigabit Ethernet switch.

These components are shown in the following figure.

Figure 7. Lenovo DSS-G storage blocks in a Storage Scale client network

The SR655 V3 servers run Red Hat Enterprise Linux which is preinstalled on the RAID-1 pair of 300 GB drives installed in the servers.

Each server requires a Lenovo RHEL Premium Support subscription. The subscription provides Level 1 and Level 2 support, with 24x7 for Severity 1 situations.

Lenovo recommended customers have RHEL Extended Update Support (EUS) enabled which provides critical patches for the LTS release of RHEL installed on the DSS-G systems. EUS is included with x86-64 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Premium subscriptions.

DSS-G can be configured with two types of license models:

• Per Disk/Flash Drive

  The number of licenses needed is based on the total number of HDDs and SSDs in the drive enclosures (excluding the logTip SSDs) and will be derived automatically by the configurator.

  This License model is available for the Data Access Edition and the Data Management Edition.

• Per managed capacity

  The number of licenses needed is based on the storage capacity being managed in an IBM Storage Scale cluster and will also be derived automatically by the configurator based on the selection of parity level made. The storage capacity to be licensed is the capacity in Tebibytes (TiB) from all Network Shared Disk (NSDs) in the IBM Storage Scale cluster after applying IBM Storage Scale RAID. The capacity to be licensed is not affected by using functions such as replication or compression or by doing tasks such as creating or deleting files, file systems, or snapshots.

  This License model is available for the Data Access Edition, the Data Management Edition, and the Erasure Code Edition.

Each of these is offered in 1, 3, 4 and 5-year support periods. The total number of Storage Scale licenses needed will be split between the two DSS-G servers. Half will appear on one server and half will appear on the other server. The license however relates to the total solution and storage drives/capacity within.

Additional licensing information:

• No additional licenses (for example, client or server) are needed for Storage Scale for DSS. Only licenses based on the number of drives (non-logtip) or capacity in TebiBytes (TiB) after applying IBM Storage Scale RAID are needed.
• Capacity licensing is measured on Binary format (1 TiB = 2^40 Bytes), which means that you must multiply the nominal Decimal format (1TB = 10^12 Bytes) chosen by drive vendors with 0.9185 to get to the actual capacity to be licensed. For DSS-G the Lenovo configurator will take care of that for you.
• For non-DSS Lenovo storage in the same Cluster (for example, separated metadata on traditional controller-based storage), you have the same options of capacity-based per Disk/Flash drive or per TiB licenses.
• It is not supported to mix Data Access Edition and Data Management Edition licensing within a cluster.
• You can expand a Data Access Edition or a Data Management Edition cluster with Erasure Code Edition systems. The limitations of Data Access Edition features apply if expanding a Data Access Edition cluster.
• Disk/Flash drive-based Storage Scale licenses can only be transferred from the existing Lenovo storage solution that is being decommissioned and re-used on its equivalent future or replacement Lenovo storage solution.
• Existing capacity licenses through for example an Enterprise License Agreement with IBM can be applied to Lenovo DSS-G after providing Proof of Entitlement. While Lenovo provides the solution level support, software support needs to be requested from IBM directly in such a case. When configuring a system using an ELA, at least 1 Lenovo Storage Scale license should be attached to the configuration to ensure customer entitlement via the Lenovo download portal functions correctly.
• Lenovo sub-contracts the L1/L2 support for IBM Storage Scale to IBM for Lenovo supplied licenses. Where a customer has premier support on the solution, they can raise a service call with Lenovo who will raise a call with IBM if required. Where a customer does not have Premium support on the DSS-G solution, the customer uses the IBM service portal to directly raise support questions for IBM Storage Scale support.

Lenovo’s cluster management software, Confluent, is used to deploy Lenovo DSS-G systems. Whilst Confluent is an open source software package, support for the software is chargeable. Support for each DSS-G server and any support nodes is normally included in the configuration.

Lenovo manufacturing implements a robust testing and integration program to ensure Lenovo EveryScale components are fully operational when shipped out of the factory. In addition to the standard component level validation performed on all hardware components produced by Lenovo, EveryScale performs rack level testing to verify that the EveryScale cluster operates as a solution. The rack level testing and validation includes the following:

• Performing a power on test. Assure device power is present, with no error indicators
• Set up RAID (when required)
• Set up storage devices and verify functionality
• Validate network connectivity and functionality
• Verify functionality of server hardware, network infrastructure, and server configuration correctness. Verify health of components
• Configure all devices per Best Recipe software settings
• Perform stress testing of server CPU and memory via software and power cycling
• Data collection for quality records and test results

Lenovo experts will manage the physical installation of your pre-integrated Racks so you can quickly benefit from your investment. Working at a time convenient to you, the technician will unpack and inspect the systems at your site, finalize the cabling, verify operation, and dispose of the packaging at the on-site location.

Any racked EveryScale solution comes with this basic Lenovo Hardware Installation services included, automatically sized and configured based on the solution scope detailed in the Lenovo EveryScale Hardware Installation Statement of Work.

Customized installation services beyond the basic Lenovo Hardware Installation services are also available to meet the specific needs of the client and for solutions with Client Site Integration Kit.

Additional client requirements beyond the basic Lenovo Hardware Installation services scope, can be offered with customized installation services sized specifically to the client’s needs.

To get operational a final onsite software installation and configuration for the specific environment is required. Lenovo can also provide comprehensive onsite configuration of software, including integration and validation for operating systems and software, virtualization and high-availability configurations.

For additional information, see the Services section.

Besides shipping fully integrated into the Lenovo 1410 rack cabinet, DSS-G solution gives clients the choice of shipping with the Lenovo Client Site Integration Kit (7X74) which allows clients to have Lenovo or a business partner install the solution in a rack of their own choosing. The Lenovo Client Site Integration Kit enables clients to gain the interoperability warranty benefit of an integrated DSS-G solution while also providing them flexibility in custom-fitting into the client datacenter.

With the Lenovo Client Site Integration Kit, the DSS-G solution is built and tested at the racklevel in Lenovo manufacturing just like described for factory integration above. Afterwards it is disassembled again, and Servers, switches and other items are packaged in individual boxes with a ship group box for cables, publications, labeling, and other rack documentation. Clients are required to purchase installation services from Lenovo or a business partner for the physical setup. The installation team will install the solution at the customer site into the customer provided rack per racking diagrams and point-to-point instructions.

The Client Side Integration Kit includes a “virtual” rack serial number for the DSS-G solution. This virtual rack serial number is used when raising service calls against the DSS-G solution.

To get operational a final onsite software installation and configuration for the specific environment is required. Lenovo can also provide comprehensive onsite configuration of software, including integration and validation for operating systems and software, virtualization and high-availability configurations.

For additional information, see the Services section.

Lenovo Distributed Storage Solution for IBM Storage Scale fully complies with ASHRAE class A2 specifications for the air-cooled data center. Please find more details in the product guides of the individual components.

• Air temperature:
  • Operating:
    • ASHRAE Class A2: 10 °C - 35 °C (50 °F - 95 °F); for altitudes above 900 m (2,953 ft), decrease the maximum ambient temperature by 1 °C for every 300-m (984-ft) increase in altitude
  • Non-operating: 5 °C - 45 °C (41 °F - 113 °F)
  • Storage: -40 °C - +60 °C (-40 °F - 140 °F)
• Maximum altitude: 3,050 m (10,000 ft)
• Humidity:
  • Operating:
    • ASHRAE Class A2: 8% - 80% (non-condensing); maximum dew point: 21 °C (70 °F)
  • Storage: 8% - 90% (non-condensing)
• Electrical:
  • 100 - 127 (nominal) V AC; 50 Hz / 60 Hz
  • 200 - 240 (nominal) V AC; 50 Hz / 60 Hz

Lenovo Distributed Storage Solution for Storage Scale adopts the conformity of its individual components to international standards, which for the server and storage enclosures are listed below:

The SR655 V3 conforms to the following standards:

• ANSI/UL 62368-1
• IEC 62368-1 (CB Certificate and CB Test Report)
• CSA C22.2 No. 62368-1
• Mexico NOM-019
• India BIS 13252 (Part 1)
• Germany GS
• TUV-GS (EN62368-1, and EK1-ITB2000)
• Ukraine UkrCEPRO
• Morocco CMIM Certification (CM)
• Russia, Belorussia and Kazakhstan, TP EAC 037/2016 (for RoHS)
• Russia, Belorussia and Kazakhstan, EAC: TP TC 004/2011 (for Safety); TP TC 020/2011 (for EMC)
• CE, UKCA Mark (EN55032 Class A, EN62368-1, EN55024, EN55035, EN61000-3-2, EN61000-3-3, (EU) 2019/424, and EN IEC 63000 (RoHS))
• FCC - Verified to comply with Part 15 of the FCC Rules, Class A
• Canada ICES-003, issue 7, Class A
• CISPR 32, Class A, CISPR 35
• Korea KN32, Class A, KN35
• Japan VCCI, Class A
• Taiwan BSMI CNS15936, Class A; CNS15598-1; Section 5 of CNS15663
• Australia/New Zealand AS/NZS CISPR 32, Class A; AS/NZS 62368.1
• UL Green Guard, UL2819
• Energy Star 4.0
• EPEAT (NSF/ ANSI 426) Bronze
• Japanese Energy-Saving Act
• EU2019/424 Energy Related Product (ErP Lot9)
• China CCC certificate, GB17625.1; GB4943.1; GB/T9254
• China CECP certificate, CQC3135
• China CELP certificate, HJ 2507-2011

The D1224 / D4390 conform to the following standards:

• BSMI CNS 13438, Class A; CNS 14336 (Taiwan)
• CCC GB 4943.1, GB 17625.1, GB 9254 Class A (China)
• CE Mark (European Union)
• CISPR 22, Class A
• EAC (Russia)
• EN55022, Class A
• EN55024
• FCC Part 15, Class A (United States)
• ICES-003/NMB-03, Class A (Canada)
• IEC/EN60950-1
• D1224: KC Mark (Korea); D3284: MSIP (Korea)
• NOM-019 (Mexico)
• D3284: RCM (Australia)
• Reduction of Hazardous Substances (ROHS)
• UL/CSA IEC 60950-1
• D1224: VCCI, Class A (Japan); D3284: VCCI, Class B (Japan)

Find more details on the regulatory compliance for the individual components in their respective product guides.

Lenovo EveryScale exclusive components (Machine Types 1410, 7X74, 0724, 0449, 7D5F; for the other Hardware and Software components configured within EveryScale their respective warranty terms apply) have a three-year customer replaceable unit (CRU) and onsite limited (for field-replaceable units (FRUs) only) warranty with standard call center support during normal business hours and 9x5 Next Business Day Parts Delivered.

Some markets might have different warranty terms and conditions than the standard warranty. This is due to local business practices or laws in the specific market. Local service teams can assist in explaining market-specific terms when needed. Examples of market-specific warranty terms are second or longer business day parts delivery or parts-only base warranty.

If warranty terms and conditions include onsite labor for repair or replacement of parts, Lenovo will dispatch a service technician to the customer site to perform the replacement. Onsite labor under base warranty is limited to labor for replacement of parts that have been determined to be field-replaceable units (FRUs). Parts that are determined to be customer-replaceable units (CRUs) do not include onsite labor under base warranty.

If warranty terms include parts-only base warranty, Lenovo is responsible for delivering only replacement parts that are under base warranty (including FRUs) that will be sent to a requested location for self-service. Parts-only service does not include a service technician being dispatched onsite. Parts must be changed at customer’s own cost and labor and defective parts must be returned following the instructions supplied with the spares parts.

The standard warranty terms are customer-replaceable unit (CRU) and onsite (for field-replaceable units FRUs only) with standard call center support during normal business hours and 9x5 Next Business Day Parts Delivered.

Lenovo’s additional support services provide a sophisticated, unified support structure for your data center, with an experience consistently ranked number one in customer satisfaction worldwide. Available offerings include:

• Premier Support

  Premier Support provides a Lenovo-owned customer experience and delivers direct access to technicians skilled in hardware, software, and advanced troubleshooting, in addition to the following:

  • Direct technician-to-technician access through a dedicated phone line
  • 24x7x365 remote support
  • Single point of contact service
  • End to end case management
  • Third-party collaborative software support
  • Online case tools and live chat support
  • On-demand remote system analysis
• Warranty Upgrade (Preconfigured Support)

  Services are available to meet the on-site response time targets that match the criticality of your systems.

  • 3, 4, or 5 years of service coverage
  • 1-year or 2-year post-warranty extensions
  • Foundation Service: 9x5 service coverage with next business day onsite response. YourDrive YourData is an optional extra (see below).
  • Essential Service: 24x7 service coverage with 4-hour onsite response or 24-hour committed repair (available only in select markets). Bundled with YourDrive YourData.
  • Advanced Service: 24x7 service coverage with 2-hour onsite response or 6-hour committed repair (available only in select markets). Bundled with YourDrive YourData.
• Managed Services

  Lenovo Managed Services provides continuous 24x7 remote monitoring (plus 24x7 call center availability) and proactive management of your data center using state-of-the-art tools, systems, and practices by a team of highly skilled and experienced Lenovo services professionals.

  Quarterly reviews check error logs, verify firmware & OS device driver levels, and software as needed. We’ll also maintain records of latest patches, critical updates, and firmware levels, to ensure you systems are providing business value through optimized performance.

• Technical Account Management (TAM)

  A Lenovo Technical Account Manager helps you optimize the operation of your data center based on a deep understanding of your business. You gain direct access to your Lenovo TAM, who serves as your single point of contact to expedite service requests, provide status updates, and furnish reports to track incidents over time. In addition, your TAM will help proactively make service recommendations and manage your service relationship with Lenovo to make certain your needs are met.

• Enterprise Server Software Support

  Enterprise Software Support is an additional support service providing customers with software support on Microsoft, Red Hat, SUSE, and VMware applications and systems. Around the clock availability for critical problems plus unlimited calls and incidents helps customers address challenges fast, without incremental costs. Support staff can answer troubleshooting and diagnostic questions, address product comparability and interoperability issues, isolate causes of problems, report defects to software vendors, and more.

• YourDrive YourData

  Lenovo’s YourDrive YourData is a multi-drive retention offering that ensures your data is always under your control, regardless of the number of drives that are installed in your Lenovo server. In the unlikely event of a drive failure, you retain possession of your drive while Lenovo replaces the failed drive part. Your data stays safely on your premises, in your hands. The YourDrive YourData service can be purchased in convenient bundles and is optional with Foundation Service. It is bundled with Essential Service and Advanced Service.

• Health Check

  Having a trusted partner who can perform regular and detailed health checks is central to maintaining efficiency and ensuring that your systems and business are always running at their best. Health Check supports Lenovo-branded server, storage, and networking devices, as well as select Lenovo-supported products from other vendors that are sold by Lenovo or a Lenovo-Authorized Reseller.

Examples of region-specific warranty terms are second or longer business day parts delivery or parts-only base warranty.

If warranty terms and conditions include onsite labor for repair or replacement of parts, Lenovo will dispatch a service technician to the customer site to perform the replacement. Onsite labor under base warranty is limited to labor for replacement of parts that have been determined to be field-replaceable units (FRUs). Parts that are determined to be customer-replaceable units (CRUs) do not include onsite labor under base warranty.

If warranty terms include parts-only base warranty, Lenovo is responsible for delivering only replacement parts that are under base warranty (including FRUs) that will be sent to a requested location for self-service. Parts-only service does not include a service technician being dispatched onsite. Parts must be changed at customer’s own cost and labor and defective parts must be returned following the instructions supplied with the spare parts.

Warranty Upgrades for D1224 Enclosure (4587)

Warranty Upgrades for 1410 Rack (1410)

Warranty Upgrades for Client Site Integration Kit (7X74)

Warranty Upgrades for DSS-G Ethernet Management Switch (7D5FCTO1WW)

On top of their individual warranty and maintenance scope or support entitlement, EveryScale offers solution-level interoperability support for HPC and AI configurations based on the above selection of Lenovo ThinkSystem portfolio and OEM components.

The extensive testing results in a “Best Recipe” release of software and firmware levels Lenovo warrants to work seamlessly together as a fully integrated data center solution instead of a collection of individual components at the time of implementation.

To see the latest Best Recipe for Scalable Infrastructure at Lenovo, see the following link:
https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/solutions/HT505184#5

The Solution Support is engaged by opening a hardware ticket based on the EveryScale Rack (Model 1410) or EveryScale Client Site Integration Kit (Model 7X74). The EveryScale Support team then will triage the issue and recommend next steps for you, including potentially to open tickets with other components of the solution.

For issues that require debugging beyond hardware and firmware (Driver, UEFI, IMM/XCC) an additional ticket will have to be opened with the software vendor (e.g. Lenovo SW Support or 3rd party SW vendor) to assist working towards a fix. The EveryScale Support team will then work with the SW Support team in isolating root cause and fixing the defect.

For more information about opening tickets, as well as the scope of support for different EveryScale components, see the Lenovo Scalable Infrastructure Support Plan information page.

When a cluster ships the most recent Best Recipe is its compliant version, which is always defined exactly for that specific Scalable Infrastructure release and the cluster is delivered as a solution of that specific release. Using a Support call clients can request a review if their solution is also compatible with a newer Best Recipe release and if it is, are able to upgrade to that while maintaining solution interoperability support.

As long as a cluster (Model 1410, 7X74) is under Lenovo warranty or maintenance entitlement, full solution interoperability support will be provided for the original Best Recipes. Even when newer Best Recipes are available the previous Recipe will remain valid and supported.

Of course, any client is free to choose to not adhere to the Best Recipe and instead deploy different software and firmware versions or integrate other components that were not tested for interoperability. While Lenovo cannot warrant interoperability with those deviations from the tested scope, a client continues to receive full break & fix support for the components based on the individual warranty and maintenance entitlement of the components. This is comparable to the level of support clients will receive when not buying it as a EveryScale solution, but building the solution from individual components – so-called “roll your own” (RYO).

In those cases, to minimize risk we suggest still staying as close as possible to the Best Recipe even when deviating. We also suggest when deviating first to test it on a small portion of the cluster and only roll it out completely if this test was stable.

For clients who need to upgrade the firmware or software of a component – for example due to OS entitlement support issues or Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) fixes – that is part of the best recipe, a support call should be placed on the 1410/7X74 rack and serial number. Lenovo product engineering will review the proposed changes, and advise the client on the viability of an upgrade path. If an upgrade can be supported and is performed, EveryScale will note the change in the support records for the solution.

Lenovo Services is a dedicated partner to your success. Our goal is to reduce your capital outlays, mitigate your IT risks, and accelerate your time to productivity.

Here’s a more in-depth look at what we can do for you:

• Asset Recovery Services

  Asset Recovery Services (ARS) helps customers recover the maximum value from their end-of-life equipment in a cost-effective and secure way. On top of simplifying the transition from old to new equipment, ARS mitigates environmental and data security risks associated with data center equipment disposal. Lenovo ARS is a cash-back solution for equipment based on its remaining market value, yielding maximum value from aging assets and lowering total cost of ownership for your customers. For more information, see the ARS page, https://lenovopress.com/lp1266-reduce-e-waste-and-grow-your-bottom-line-with-lenovo-ars.

• Assessment Services

  An Assessment helps solve your IT challenges through an onsite, multi-day session with a Lenovo technology expert. We perform a tools-based assessment which provides a comprehensive and thorough review of a company's environment and technology systems. In addition to the technology based functional requirements, the consultant also discusses and records the non-functional business requirements, challenges, and constraints. Assessments help organizations like yours, no matter how large or small, get a better return on your IT investment and overcome challenges in the ever-changing technology landscape.

• Design Services

  Professional Services consultants perform infrastructure design and implementation planning to support your strategy. The high-level architectures provided by the assessment service are turned into low level designs and wiring diagrams, which are reviewed and approved prior to implementation. The implementation plan will demonstrate an outcome-based proposal to provide business capabilities through infrastructure with a risk-mitigated project plan.

• Basic Hardware Installation

  Lenovo experts can seamlessly manage the physical installation of your server, storage, or networking hardware. Working at a time convenient for you (business hours or off shift), the technician will unpack and inspect the systems on your site, install options, mount in a rack cabinet, connect to power and network, check and update firmware to the latest levels, verify operation, and dispose of the packaging, allowing your team to focus on other priorities.

• Deployment Services

  When investing in new IT infrastructures, you need to ensure your business will see quick time to value with little to no disruption. Lenovo deployments are designed by development and engineering teams who know our Products & Solutions better than anyone else, and our technicians own the process from delivery to completion. Lenovo will conduct remote preparation and planning, configure & integrate systems, validate systems, verify and update appliance firmware, train on administrative tasks, and provide post-deployment documentation. Customer’s IT teams leverage our skills to enable IT staff to transform with higher level roles and tasks.

• Integration, Migration, and Expansion Services

  Move existing physical & virtual workloads easily, or determine technical requirements to support increased workloads while maximizing performance. Includes tuning, validation, and documenting ongoing run processes. Leverage migration assessment planning documents to perform necessary migrations.

• Data Center Power and Cooling Services

  The Data Center Infrastructure team will provide solution design and implementation services to support the power and cooling needs of the multi-node chassis and multi-rack solutions. This includes designing for various levels of power redundancy and integration into the customer power infrastructure. The Infrastructure team will work with site engineers to design an effective cooling strategy based on facility constraints or customer goals and optimize a cooling solution to ensure high efficiency and availability. The Infrastructure team will provide the detailed solution design and complete integration of the cooling solution into the customer data center. In addition, the Infrastructure team will provide rack and chassis level commissioning and stand-up of the water-cooled solution which includes setting and tuning of the flow rates based on water temperature and heat recovery targets. Lastly, the Infrastructure team will provide cooling solution optimization and performance validation to ensure the highest overall operational efficiency of the solution.

Installation Services

To get operational a final onsite software installation and configuration for the specific environment is required. Five days of Lenovo Professional Services are included by default with the DSS-G solutions to get customers up and running quickly. This selection can be removed if so desired when for example an experienced channel partner of Lenovo will provide those services.

Services are tailored to the customer need and typically include:

• Conduct a preparation and planning call
• Configure Confluent on the SR630 V2 quorum/management server
• Verify, and update if needed, firmware and software versions to implement the DSS-G
• Configure the network settings specific to the customer environment for
  • XClarity Controller (XCC) service processors on the SR650 V2 and SR630 V2 servers
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux on the SR650 V2 and SR630 V2 servers
• Configure IBM Storage Scale on the DSS-G servers
• Create file and exporting systems from the DSS-G storage
• Provide skills transfer to customer personnel
• Develop post-installation documentation describing the specifics of the firmware/software versions and network and file system configuration work that was done

For more information, see these resources:

• Lenovo DSS-G product page
  https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/data-center/servers/high-density/Distributed-Storage-Solution-for-IBM-Spectrum-Scale/p/WMD00000275
• Lenovo high-density offerings page
  https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/c/data-center/servers/high-density
• Paper, "DSS-G Declustered RAID Technology and Rebuild Performance"
  https://lenovopress.com/lp1227-dss-g-declustered-raid-technology-and-rebuild-performance
• ThinkSystem SR655 V3 Product Guide
  https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1610-thinksystem-sr655-v3-server#internal-drive-options
• x-config configurator:
  https://lesc.lenovo.com/products/hardware/configurator/worldwide/bhui/asit/index.html
• Lenovo DSS-G datasheet:
  https://lenovopress.com/DS0026

• Lenovo DSS-G product life-cycle:
  https://support.lenovo.com/gb/en/solutions/ht510974

• Lenovo 1U Switched and Monitored Rack PDUs product guide:
  https://lenovopress.lenovo.com/lp1556