Home > Storage > PowerMax and VMAX > Mainframe > Dell PowerMax: Data Protector for z Systems (zDP) Best Practices > Overview
SnapVX and zDP run in the SCF address space that is delivered by Mainframe Enablers software. The SCF address space runs on a z/OS LPAR. This SCF address space has connectivity to the PowerMax through gatekeeper devices. Besides the space consumption-risk that is mentioned previously in this paper, the primary consideration when using SnapVX and zDP on the local (DC1) storage environment is the host performance impact. Snapshot creation is not free from a z/OS-host-response-time perspective. Even though snapshot intervals may be as short as five minutes, it may be preferable to use rolling small-interval snapshots for cyber protection in a remote-array (DC2) deployment. The ideal environment for the local array (production site) includes daily full-volume backup applications. In this environment, the snapshot only ages for 24 hours before it can be terminated after the backup has completed. Typically, the space usage is far lower than a full clone would require.
There are two main reasons to implement SnapVX and zDP locally (DC1 environment):
TimeFinder SnapVX can be used selectively to link a subset of the volumes in a zDP snapset using the ZDP(YES) parameter in the TimeFinder SnapVX LINK job. This practice provides another option to surgically select volumes to recover data from.