I wouldn't try to put everything on a single physical NIC... Especially one that's only running at 100Mbps. Add another supported NIC (if you don't already have one inside the host) and set it up for iSCSI traffic. If your iSCSI target, and network switch, support jumbo frames, enable that via the CLI commands... I would use the vMA to do this under ESXi. If you don't have jumbo frames support on the entire string/chain, then you won't need to enable it on the host. BUT, if you do plan on going that direction later, you might want to at least put it onto the host configuration. That way you won't need to destroy the vSwitch later when you do want to enable it.
I would also have enough NIC's to place the management network on it's own connection, then the VM's on their own set. I do this as SOP when setting up hosts, even in my lab environment. Network connections IS one of the important items you need to proplerly allocate when you're setting up a host... While the minimum you need to run ESX/ESXi is one, you really do need more if you're going to run VM's and use a NAS/SAN... I find that you should have three or four ports to run a lab environment (under ten VM's) and at least two more if you're planning to use a SAN/NAS for the VM's to reside upon. Typically, I spec out a minimum of six to eight network ports on each host, with ten being even better (allowing for full redundancy, and splitting some of the iSCSI type traffic). I would also go with Gb network hardware across the board. Even in a lab.
Network Administrator
VMware VCP4
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