Relocating Your On-Prem Qumulo Cluster

IN THIS ARTICLE

Outlines guidelines and best practices for physically moving your on-prem Qumulo cluster to a new location

REQUIREMENTS

• Qumulo hardware cluster that you need to physically move to a different location

DETAILS

When you need to relocate your on-prem Qumulo cluster, doing so in a safe manner is critical in order to best protect your cluster. Follow the steps detailed in the sections below to ensure that Qumulo best practices are followed, thereby maintaining the Qumulo Support Services Agreement for your cluster.

Contact Qumulo Care

Before moving your cluster to a different location, please Contact Qumulo Care to provide the new location and timeline of when the move can be expected. Our team can then disable Qumulo's Cloud-Based Monitoring during the transfer and update our systems to ensure no disruption occurs with future shipments of replacement parts for your cluster in its new location.

For non-Qumulo hardware (such as HPE), please reach out to the OEM hardware vendor in order to ensure you move the cluster in accordance with their best practice requirements.  

Contact Qumulo Care as well so we can update our systems, manage Qumulo's Cloud-Based Monitoring, and assist as needed through our Professional Services with any necessary reconfiguration needed once the cluster has been relocated.

Additionally, the Qumulo Care team will be in touch to ensure you are ready to move the cluster in accordance with Qumulo best practices and that you have the necessary shipping boxes for safe relocation.

Qumulo Professional Services

We highly recommend running through the same Pre-Installation Checklist planning that you went through during your cluster's initial installation for the new location. This will ensure your new location is ready for your cluster and you can be operational again as quickly as possible.

Qumulo Professional Services are available for purchase to manage the planning of your move, configure the cluster at the new location, and perform a health check and validation tests on the cluster.

Prep the Cluster

The following best practices must be followed in order for the cluster to continue to be covered by your Qumulo Support Services Agreement:

• Ensure any replication jobs to other clusters are completed before you power down the cluster to move it
• Prepare your cluster’s network configuration for relocation by following the instructions provided in our Move a Cluster to a Different Network article
• For 4U nodes, remove all drives. HDDs can be re-inserted into any HDD slot and SSDs can be re-inserted into an SSD slot, so long as all drives are re-inserted into the exact same node upon relocation.  
• Check out the QC Series Drive Diagrams article for HDD and SSD drive locations.
• Record the node order before moving to ensure the nodes can be re-racked in the same order at the new location.
• Pack all nodes in Qumulo-certified shipping boxes.
• For 1U and 2U nodes, HDDs and node are packaged in a single box together
• For 4U nodes, the node is packaged into one box and the HDDs are in a second

Shipping Best Practices

Qumulo is not responsible for the relocation of your cluster and the use of the Qumulo-certified shipping boxes does not provide a guarantee of protection against damage incurred during transit. To help minimize such risk, Qumulo recommends that all boxes should be shipped on a pallet using a suitably experienced IT hardware relocation specialist courier with appropriate insurance coverage.

• For 1U and 2U nodes, stack no more than 3 units high per pallet
• For 4U nodes, stack no more than 2 units high per pallet
• Use an air ride truck for transportation
• Ensure your onsite spare drives are relocated along with the cluster

Damaged Hardware

In the event that your Qumulo hardware is damaged during transit, please take immediate action to notify your shipping vendor as well as the appropriate shipping insurance provider. Additionally, notify the Qumulo Care team with details of what was damaged during transit as soon as possible so that we can provide replacement hardware cost estimates for the insurance provider as needed.

RESOLUTION

You should now understand the guidelines and best practices for physically moving your on-prem Qumulo cluster to a new location

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Contact Qumulo Care

Qumulo Professional Services

Qumulo's Cloud-Based Monitoring

Move a Cluster to a Different Network

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