A Guide for Moving Disks to Cold Storage

Introduction

This guide offers a detailed walkthrough for transitioning managed disks within Azure to cold storage, an economical solution ideal for housing seldom-accessed data like backups and archival materials. Organizations can substantially reduce storage expenses by opting for cold storage despite the longer retrieval times compared to hotter or cooler storage tiers.

Three main steps make up the process

1. Generating a Shared Access Signature (SAS) URL for the source disk: This URL provides secure, temporary access to the disk data without exposing account keys.
2. Creating SAS token for the destination storage account: This token enables controlled access to the storage account where the disk data will be moved.
3. Using AzCopy to transfer the disk data and changing the storage tier to cold: AzCopy is a powerful command-line tool that facilitates data transfer between storage accounts, ensuring efficient and reliable movement of large amounts of data.

Through adherence to this guide, entities may guarantee safe and effective data transfers by utilizing Azure’s integrated capabilities and resources. Data security and integrity can be preserved during transfer by properly managing SAS tokens and utilizing AzCopy. A crucial procedure for cloud data lifecycle management, switching the storage tier to cold also aids in cost optimization.

Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1: Generate Disk SAS URL

Navigate to the Azure Portal:

Open the Azure portal.

Locate the Disk:

Navigate to “All resources” or utilize the search function to find the desired managed disk

Generate SAS URL:

Select the disk from the list.

Within the disk’s overview blade, click the “Export” button at the top.

Define the expiration time for the SAS URL.

Click on “Generate URL.”

Copy the provided URL; this serves as your Disk SAS URL.

Copy the provided URL; this serves as your Disk SAS URL.

Step 2: Generate Storage SAS Token for Destination

Navigate to the Azure Portal:

Open the Azure portal.

Locate the Storage Account:

Head to “Storage accounts” and choose the storage account designated for the disk’s relocation.

Generate SAS Token:

Under “Settings,” navigate to “Shared access signature.”

Specify the permitted services (Blob, File, etc.), resource types, and permissions (Read, Write, etc.).

Set the start and expiration time.

Verify that the option “Generate SAS and connection string” is chosen.

Copy the SAS token that appears in the “SAS token” box.

Additionally, copy the blob storage location.

Step 3: Move Disk to Cold Storage (Convert to Block Blob)

Execute AzCopy Command:

Utilize the following command, substituting placeholders with actual values:

Replace the placeholders with actual values:

<Source-Disk-sas-URL>: The SAS URL generated for the source.

<destination-storage-account>: The destination storage account name.

<destination-container>: The destination container name.

<destination-blob>: The destination blob name.

<destination-sas-token>: The destination’s SAS token

Example:

Now Run the above command in azure cloud cli

We must change the tier to cold storage after moving the unallocated disk to blob storage.

Change Tier to Cold Storage:

Select the disk to move to cold storage.

Choose “Change tier.”

Change the storage to the cold tier.

Save.

Conclusion

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