Exchange 2007 Best Practices

[terran0925]

With the improved performance of vSphere 4, is it still best practice to use RDM?

[AndreTheGiant]

IMHO RDM usage is not necessary on small/medium systems... also with VI 3.5.

See also VMware Best Practice:

http://www.vmware.com/solutions/ business-critical-apps/exchange

Andre

[VMmatty]

Using an RDM isn't going to necessarily give you better performance than using a VMDK file. You'll want to use RDMs if you want access to SAN array software for snapshots/replication. You also may need it depending on if you're clustering Exchange.

If you have a single Exchange server with the mailbox role and no clustering and have no need for SAN based snapshots, etc, then using a VMDK file is fine. To me the decision comes down less to performance and more to overall interaction with the storage array.

Finally, if you're going to virtualize Exchange make sure that you're doing so in a manner that is supported by Microsoft. Make sure you run through the SVVP Support Policy Wizard to ensure your setup meets Microsoft's requirements for support:

http://www.windowsservercatalog.com/svvp.aspx?svvppage=svvpwizard.htm