Share LUN with ISOS to more than 32 ESX HOST

[Hernan_Gutmer]

Hello to all!

I know that there is a max numbers of 32 patch to a single LUN.

But, is it possible to share a LUN with only ISOS to more than 32 ESX Host ?

This LUN will be only acceded when from eny ESX Host i create a new VMguest and use the ISO file for a OS installation.

Tnank you!

[Texiwill]

Hello,

Instead of using a LUN use an NFS share for your ISO images. An NFS share has no host number limitations.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[Hernan_Gutmer]

Thank you for your rapid response.

I know that NFS is it possible, the think is that i´m trying to avoid put VM Guest traffic with NFS traffic on the same network because i dont have a separated network for NFS at this moment.

Do you think that it could be possible to share the LUN with more than 50,60 90 ESX Hosts?

[Texiwill]

Hello,

I do not think it is possible. But that depends on the SAN infrastructure more than anything. You could instead use the concept of a deployment ESX host, that you use to create your VMs, test them, then vMotion them to the appropriate host after everything is done. This way you only need a few mountpoints for the LUN.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[Hernan_Gutmer]

I understand you point, the problem is that not all ESX Host share all the LUNs at this moment becasuse Vmotion was not fully implemented yet.

Who put the 32 path to a LUN restriction? Why i cant put more than 50 ESX to a single LUN ? Its a storage or ESX Server Restriction ?

Thank you for your help Edward!

pd : I read you book a few weeks ago, its really good°!!!

cheers

Hernan Gutmer

[Hernan_Gutmer]

In case i cant share this LUN with more than 50 or more Servers. can i use a VMWare Guest machine as NFS Server instead of use a Physicall Box ?

I would like to use SAN storage (Hard Drive "D" for the VM Guest with at least 10GB) then i will configure all ESX Host to connect through NFS port group to this Virtual Machine.

What do you think ?

Thank you very much for you help!

..

Hernan Gutmer

[Texiwill]

Hello,

VMware put in the restriction mainly because they only support a cluster of so many ESX servers. Also, consider this, when you have many nodes attached to a LUN there is a better chance of SCSI Reservation conflicts and that is a very bad occurrence. For example, on my MSA1000 I would never connect more than 4 nodes to the same LUN.

In your case, you do not need to use vMotion. you could once the VM is installed, power it down and use cold migration to move the VM to appropriate machine/LUN combination. In many cases this may be the better approach. It gives you a staging area that can be protected and off the main network for example, then allow you to move the VM to the appropriate production server using either vMotion or cold migration.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[Texiwill · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Yes you can create a VM that acts as a NFS Server, but you have the same issues with a vmkernel device for NFS. And you should probably have that VM on your administrative network, etc.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[Hernan_Gutmer]

This is way i think the best way will be put a physicall box as an NFS Share and cross rhe finger when connect all the ESX Host there

Thank you for your time, your answers were veru good for me.