POWER7 information

Managing logical partition resources dynamically

You use the Hardware Management Console (HMC) to add, remove, or move processor, memory, and I/O resources between running logical partitions without restarting the logical partitions or the managed system.

Dynamic resource management is used only for running logical partitions. If a logical partition is not running, you cannot add resources to that logical partition dynamically or remove resources from that logical partition dynamically. Also, if you shut down a logical partition, you cannot move resources dynamically to or from that logical partition. (However, the resources that were used by that logical partition can be added dynamically to running logical partitions.) You can change the resource allocations for an idle logical partition by changing the properties of the partition profiles used by that logical partition. When you start the logical partition using one of the changed partition profiles, the managed system applies the changes to the logical partition.

Dynamic Platform Optimizer
POWER7® processor-based servers with firmware at level 7.6, or later, can support the Dynamic Platform Optimizer (DPO) function. DPO is a hypervisor function initiated from the Hardware Management Console (HMC). DPO rearranges logical partition processors and memory on the system to improve the affinity between processors and memory of logical partitions. When DPO is running, mobility operations that target the system that is being optimized are blocked. Also, when DPO is running, many virtualization features are blocked. When a DPO operation is in progress and you want to dynamically add, remove, or move physical memory to or from running logical partitions, you must either wait for the DPO operation to complete or manually stop the DPO operation.
Starting and stopping a Dynamic Platform Optimizer operation
You can run the optmem command from the Hardware Management Console (HMC) command line on POWER7 processor-based servers with firmware at level 7.6, or later, to start a Dynamic Platform Optimizer (DPO) operation or stop a DPO operation that is currently running.
Scheduling Dynamic Platform Optimizer operations
Scheduled operation of the Dynamic Platform Optimizer (DPO) function is supported on POWER7 processor-based servers with firmware at level 7.6, or later. The Hardware Management Console (HMC) must be at Version 7.8.0 or later.
Querying affinity scores of a logical partition
On POWER7 processor-based servers with firmware at level 7.8, or later, the HMC provides an additional flag with the lsmemopt command for querying the current affinity score and the potential affinity score of a logical partition.
Managing dedicated memory dynamically
You can add, remove, and move physical memory dynamically to and from running logical partitions that use dedicated memory using the Hardware Management Console (HMC). This allows you to adjust the physical memory allocated to each logical partition that uses dedicated memory without having to shut down the logical partitions.
Managing shared memory dynamically
You can dynamically add and remove logical memory and I/O entitled memory to and from a logical partition that uses shared memory (hereafter referred to as a shared memory partition) using the Hardware Management Console (HMC).
Managing processor resources dynamically
You can dynamically add, remove, and move processor resources to and from running logical partitions using the Hardware Management Console (HMC). This allows you to adjust the processor resources allocated to each logical partition without having to shut down the logical partitions.
Managing physical I/O devices and slots dynamically
You can dynamically add, remove, and move physical I/O devices and slots to and from running logical partitions using the Hardware Management Console (HMC). This allows logical partitions to share infrequently used I/O devices (such as optical disk drives).
Managing virtual adapters dynamically
You can dynamically add and remove virtual adapters to and from running logical partitions using the Hardware Management Console (HMC).
Managing SR-IOV logical ports dynamically
You can dynamically add, edit, and remove single root I/O virtualization (SR-IOV) logical ports to and from running logical partitions by using the Hardware Management Console (HMC).
Managing 5250 CPW dynamically
You can dynamically add, remove, and move 5250 commercial processing workload (5250 CPW) to and from running logical partitions using the Hardware Management Console (HMC).
Scheduling the movement of resources to and from logical partitions
You can use the Hardware Management Console (HMC) to schedule the movement of dedicated memory, logical memory, dedicated processors, shared processors, and I/O devices between running logical partitions on a managed system. This allows you to move resources between running logical partitions without user intervention.
Saving the logical partition configuration to a partition profile
You can save the current configuration of a logical partition to a new partition profile using the Hardware Management Console (HMC). Use this procedure if you change the configuration of a logical partition using dynamic partitioning and you do not want to lose the changes when you reactivate the logical partition. This procedure allows you to save the changed configuration to a new partition profile instead of having to enter the changed resource allocations manually.

Parent topic: Managing logical partitions

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Last updated: Thu, September 20, 2018