EA-enabled table spaces and index spaces

You can enable partitioned table spaces for extended addressability (EA), a function of DFSMS. The term for table spaces and index spaces that are enabled for extended addressability is EA-enabled.

You must use EA-enabled table spaces or index spaces if you specify a maximum partition size (DSSIZE) that is larger than 4 GB in the CREATE TABLESPACE statement.

Both EA-enabled and non-EA-enabled partitioned table spaces can have only one table and up to 4096 partitions. The following table summarizes the differences.

Table 1. Differences between EA-enabled and non-EA-enabled table spaces
EA-enabled table spaces	Non-EA-enabled table spaces
Holds up to 4096 partitions of 64 GB	Holds up to 4096 partitions of 4 GB
Created with any valid value of DSSIZE	DSSIZE cannot exceed 4 GB
Data sets are managed by SMS	Data sets are managed by VSAM or SMS
Requires setup	No additional setup