Moving AIX from physical to virtual

Moving an AIX system from a physical system to a virtual LPAR (Logical Partition) is not really any different from procedures you would have in moving from one physical server to another physical server. As with a physical server, you need to have a network connection (Ethernet) and a storage device defined for the partition.

With PowerVM, the Ethernet connection is assigned via the HMC (Hardware Management Console). This connection is called a Shared Ethernet Adapter (SEA) where the physical adapter is owned by the VIO (Virtual I/O) Server and then shared with the LPARs. The AIX partition operates with its own IP and as if it had its own adapter.

The Storage devices also have several options based on customer preference.

They can be attached non-virtualized to physical adapters like standalone systems or

by Two Basic Virtualized scenarios for LPAR Storage,

(1) A Virtual Disk. Assigned to LPAR via VIO server. The size is defined by VIO server, it can be a portion of the volume group or specific LUNs. The disks appear to LPAR as a generic SCSI disk.

(2) Virtual Fiberchanel adapter. With NPIV (N-port ID Virtualization) the VIO Server “owns” the adapter, but the adapter has multiple virtual WWN ports and a unique port number gets assigned via the VIO Server to an LPAR. The LPAR would then have that WWN and would function as a standard WWN port with SAN LUNs assigned to it.

To move your rootvg and other data from existing system to your new LPAR, there are many ways of accomplishing this and which you use will depend on your choice of storage setup, proximity of the servers, whether they are on the same network and whether they are on the same SAN.

A Brief review of some of your options for moving rootvg.

If Currently SAN attached:

• Mirror rootvg to another SAN disk, then remap that disk to the new LPAR

• Clone (alt_dsk_copy) to another SAN disk and remap to new LPAR

If Currently locally attached or not on same SAN;

• Mksysb onto tape or CD, restore onto LPAR. Selecting the disk assigned during LPAR creation. The system’s CD drive can be temporarily assigned to LPAR for this purpose.

• NIM (Network Install Manager) can be used to create a mksysb from one network attached system and install it onto another.

• Connect to target SAN and copy to SAN via Mirror or alt_disk_copy, remap to new LPAR

Other Volume groups can be moved in a similar manner, mirror, export, import.