When you decide where to locate file systems, you typically try to balance I/O load among the available disk drives. The effectiveness of this approach is limited. It is difficult to predict future usage patterns, and you cannot split file systems across the drives. For example, if a single file system receives the most disk accesses, moving the file system to another drive also moves the bottleneck.

VxVM can split volumes across multiple drives. This approach gives you a finer level of granularity when you locate data. After you measure access patterns, you can adjust your decisions on where to place file systems. You can reconfigure volumes online without adversely impacting their availability.