File Servers are a bit questionable, but for SQL/Exchange it depends on if you want to use the features of the ASMME for it.
If you plan to present any VMFS from the ESX hosts though, definitely install the ESX DSM. If you do VMFS for SQL/Exchange, make sure the virtual SCSI adaptor is the paravirtualized one as it can make a big difference on boxes with heavy IO requirements. DAMIEN SOLODOW Systems Engineer 317.447.6033 (office) 317.217.6851 (fax) HARRISON COLLEGE From: Kim Longenbaugh [mailto:k...@colonialsavings.com] Sent: Monday, April 04, 2011 1:04 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: MS iSCSI initiators in VM guests There will be some of each type that you mentioned. File services, SQL 2005/2008, Exchange 2010. I agree that there's some advantages to be gained using the EQL HIT kits, both in the guest and the ESX servers. From: N Parr [mailto:npar...@mortonind.com] Sent: Monday, April 04, 2011 11:34 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: MS iSCSI initiators in VM guests We use option two here, there are a lot of very good EQ/Dell best practice white papers dealing with this exact topic. You didn't say what's going to be running on your servers. File, SQL, Exchange, etc. But if you don't do iSCSI inside the guest you lose all capability to make use of the integrated EQ tools for snapping DB's etc. The folks that say to use VMFS partitions for everything are probably using SAN's that don't have the capabilities your EQ's do. We have multiple SQL servers with multiple vNics using EQ's iSCSI MPIO overlay inside the guest and it works great. Doing the same thing with my virtualized file server and soon Exchange 2010. ________________________________ From: Kim Longenbaugh [mailto:k...@colonialsavings.com] Sent: Monday, April 04, 2011 10:46 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: MS iSCSI initiators in VM guests I considered using an "OT" tag, but decided this is not OT for the list. We're having an often heated debate on how to attach data drives in Win2003/Win2008 guests in our new VM 4.1 environment. We use Dell Equallogic iSCSI attached SAN arrays. Some folks say it's best to attach all the drives, whether it's an OS volume (C:\) or data drives, through the Vmware ESX iSCSI initiators, which would force us to use VMFS partitions (having decided again RDMs or NFS partitions). There's also a group that says that only the c:\ drive should be attached using the Vmware ESX iSCSI initiators, and the guests should be attached with guest-based initiators, either the MS one, or the Equallogic-furnished initiator with its own specific DSM. Who uses which method, and what's your pros and cons for each? Thanks Kim ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
