Also known as thin provisioning, though the EMC virtual disks may have additional features above just presenting a size which doesn't always use that many physical blocks.
~JasonG > -----Original Message----- > From: sms adm [mailto:sms...@gmail.com] > Sent: Thursday, July 22, 2010 12:08 > To: MS-Exchange Admin Issues > Subject: Re: Guidance on disks for Exchange 2010 > > I would be interested in anyone doing this or thinking about doing this > in an EMC storage environment. > Just attended a 1/2 seminar by EMC where they espoused virtual disks that > could/would expand when needed. > > One thing shown was disturbing (to me at least). > They said MS was targeting 25GB mailboxes in 3 years (effort to keep up > with Google). > Comments? > > Thx in advance > > > On Thu, Jul 22, 2010 at 12:01 PM, Michael B. Smith > <mich...@smithcons.com> wrote: > > > Note: I am not recommending you go against published guidance from > MSFT. > > > > That being said - that recommendation is primarily against the > original Hyper-V. VHDs created by the original version of Hyper-V, or > disks that have been upgraded from Virtual Server or Virtual PC, expand > quite slowly. > > > > Disks that are created by Hyper-V R2 are only a couple of > percentage points slower than fixed size VHDs. Negligible. > > > > I know a number of companies that are running Hyper-V R2 > installations with variable disks. So far, at least, it hasn't been an > issue. > > > > I don't know how (or even if) this impacts VMware or XenServer. > > > > So....to tie this back to your question, if the storage > virtualization causes Exchange to notice whenever the disk expands, it's > not a good fit. > > > > Regards, > > > > Michael B. Smith > > Consultant and Exchange MVP > > http://TheEssentialExchange.com > > > > From: Sobey, Richard A [mailto:r.so...@imperial.ac.uk] > Sent: Thursday, July 22, 2010 6:35 AM > > To: MS-Exchange Admin Issues > > Subject: Guidance on disks for Exchange 2010 > > > > In the virtualisation guide for Exchange 2010, in the section on > storage this is written: > > > > Virtual disks that dynamically expand aren't supported by > Exchange. > > > > Does anyone know if this also applies to a disk presented to a > physical server via some form of storage virtualisation appliance? Said > disk would be presented as 100GB, for example, and the OS would see > 100GB, but would grow to reach this size at the storage level. > > > > Thanks > > > > Richard > > > > > > > -- > smsadm
