Set Storage Tiers

To reduce data storage costs, you can assign a storage tier to datastores or datastore clusters.

• Datastores — When you set a storage tier for a datastore, the tier is also assigned to the datastore's actual location on disk (which is displayed as the Location property for a datastore). You can't assign a storage tier to a datastore that's part of a datastore cluster. In that case, you must assign the storage tier at the datastore cluster level. When you change a datastore's storage tier, the costs of VMs on that datastore are automatically recalculated.
• Datastore Clusters — When you set a storage tier for a datastore cluster, all datastores in that cluster are assigned the same storage tier. When you move a datastore into a datastore cluster, the datastore is automatically assigned the storage tier of the cluster. When you move a datastore out of a datastore cluster, the datastore retains the storage tier of the parent cluster.

You can rename storage tiers so they're easier to identify. For example, you can rename Storage Tier 1 to SSD SAN. For information on how to rename storage tiers, see Storage tiers.

Note that when you configure storage tiers, you must ensure that datastores are available to back them. When a user requests a VM without an assigned storage tier, automated deployment uses the default storage tier specified by the cost model that is applied to the deployment destination. If the deployment destination for the service request doesn't target a datastore for that storage tier, the automated deployment will fail.

For example, if a highly available datastore isn't assigned to the default storage tier for a VM that's configured to be highly available, automated deployment will fail. As such, it's important to always configure the default storage tier to be backed by datastores for vCenter, SCVMM highly available storage, and SCVMM non-HA storage. If this configuration isn't possible due to the way you use storage, create a case through the Snow Support Portal to look into other configuration options. For information about cost models and how to assign costs to storage tiers, see Configure Cost Models.

To set a storage tier for a datastore or a datastore cluster:

1. From the inventory tree, select a datastore or a datastore cluster.
2. On the Summary tab, click Actions > Set Storage Tier.
3. In the Set Storage Tier dialog, select a storage tier and click OK.