Data ONTAP features two types of volumes:
Traditional volumes
Traditional volumes behave identically to volumes in Data ONTAP releases prior to version 7.0. They combine the physical layer of storage (the disk and RAID properties) with the logical layer of the file system (the volumes and any other containers that are used to store files and directories).
Flexible volumes (also called FlexVol volumes)
Flexible volumes allow you to manage the logical layer of the file system independently of the physical layer of storage. Multiple flexible volumes can exist within a single separate, physically defined aggregate structure of disks and RAID groups. Flexible volumes contained by the same aggregate share the physical storage resources, RAID configuration, and plex structure of that aggregate.
Flexible volumes represent a significant administrative improvement over traditional volumes. Using multiple flexible volumes enables you to do the following:
Perform administrative and maintenance tasks (for example, backup and restore) on individual flexible volumes rather than on a single, large file system.
Set services (for example, snapshot schedules) differently for individual flexible volumes.
Minimize interruptions in data availability by taking individual flexible volumes offline to perform administrative tasks on them while the other flexible volumes remain online.
Save time by backing up and restoring individual flexible volumes instead of all the file systems an aggregate contains.
Note For backward compatibility, volumes created prior to Data ONTAP 7.0 are displayed as traditional volumes in FilerView.
You can create up to 200 flexible and traditional volumes on a single filer. In addition, the following limits apply.
Traditional volumes–You can have up to 100 traditional volumes and aggregates combined on a single filer.
Flexible volumes–The only limit imposed on flexible volumes is the overall system limit of 200 for all volumes.
For clusters, these limits apply to each node individually, so the overall limits for the pair are doubled.
For more information on flexible and traditional volumes, see the Data ONTAP Storage Management Guide.