Before you begin: All storage classes defined by your installation are automatically assigned the default PAV value of Nopreference, which means that all PAV and non-PAV volumes are treated equally. To force volume selection to differentiate between them, you need to modify the PAV option in the storage class.

The following list comprises the planning steps that you must complete before you can successfully implement the PAV option in the storage class:

1. Verify that ESS devices have the PAV capability enabled using the DEVSERV command.

   Example: DS QPAVS,devnum

   For information about using the DEVSERV command, see z/OS MVS System Commands.

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2. Determine which data sets require high performance. You could assign a PAV value of Required or Preferred to those data sets.

   Data sets that require high performance could include frequently accessed data sets and critical data sets. For example, if certain jobs are taking too long because data sets used by these jobs are on non-PAV volumes, you might allocate those data sets on PAV volumes to determine if that improves their performance.

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3. Decide whether to assign the PAV option to existing storage classes. If you do not specify the PAV option in the storage class, the default value is Nopreference.

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4. Decide whether to create any new storage classes that use the PAV option.

Now you are ready to implement the SMS PAV option in the storage class.