Once you have fully configured and validated the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure cluster, you can add storage.
The first step to presenting PowerFlex volumes to the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure cluster involves creating the volumes in the PowerFlex Manager. As a best practice, create one volume at a time. This ensures that the volumes are easily identifiable from the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure cluster.
Create a volume in the PowerFlex Manager UI
To create the volume on the PowerFlex cluster, perform the following steps:
Map the volume to the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure cluster
Create the CSV on the APEX Cloud Platform for Azure cluster
Once the volume is mapped to all MC nodes, perform the following steps to set the volume up as a CSV:
- Initialize the disk.
- Create a partition.
- Format the volume.
- Create the CSV.
- Rename the CSV.
As a best practice, use Windows Admin Center to create the CSV because all the above steps can be accomplished with a single click. Dell engineering also used PowerShell to perform these steps.
To create the CSV using Windows Admin Center, perform the following steps: