Home > Storage > PowerMax and VMAX > Storage Admin > Dell PowerMax and VMware vSphere Configuration Guide > Dell TimeFinder overview
The TimeFinder family of products operates on PowerMax devices. Using TimeFinder on a PowerMax device containing a VMFS requires that all extents of the file system be replicated. Dell Technologies does not recommend spanning, so a single device represents the VMFS. However all data on the device is copied, including inventory items such as disk images or ISOs which usually would not require it. Therefore, Dell Technologies recommends separation of virtual machines from other objects that do not require replication. This separation does not completely eliminate replication of unneeded data but minimizes the storage overhead.
Each TimeFinder software product has different performance and availability characteristics. However, functionally all variants of TimeFinder software are used to create a copy. Therefore, the focus is on SnapVX. Where appropriate, however, mention is made of any important differences between other modes.
In addition to TimeFinder, this chapter discusses the integration that is known as VMware Storage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI). One of the primitives of these APIs is Full Copy, or XCOPY (the SCSI command). This primitive offloads the process of copying and cloning a VM/VMDK to the PowerMax to increase both overall system performance and efficiency. Full copy delivers hardware-accelerated copying of data by performing all duplication and migration operations on the array. Customers using VAAI can achieve considerably faster data movement through VMware Storage vMotion, deployment from templates, and virtual machine cloning.