Clustering Without SAN

[smkrt]

I have 2 ESX Servers in my environment, I dont have SAN in my environment.

I want to use the clustering feature with Vmotion

Machine A

Xeon Processor 2.6 GHz

Memory 16 GB

Disks = 70 GB

Machine B

Processor 1.8 GHz

Memory 2 GB

Disks = 700 GB

Is it possible in some way to have vmotion enable cluster? and is there any possibility that I can use the diskstorage on Machine B and Power On the virtual machine from MACHINE A?

I think my question would be better if I rephrase it as "How can I configure NFS on my diskstorage to be Share the disk with other ESX server in the enironment"

[Stisse-SYSteam]

Hi,

Sorry, but this is not possible without a shared SAN to do a Vmotion. Isci SAN is the cheepest.

/Stefan Krantz

[Vodder]

Vmotion is possible with NAS in 3.5. You can use opensource NAS software to set this up, though the names escape me at the moment. There are a lot of mentions of them in these forums if you search.

[Berniebgf]

Hi

You can achieve this type of configuration with DataCore SANmelody running as Virtual machines on each ESX server.

I have not tried this configuration, would be interesting to see how it performs and also how hard it would be to manage...

But, may be worth a play in test/dev environment..

Here is the technical document, it is a very good read.

BernieT

http://sanmelody.blogspot.com

[smkrt]

Yes, I have seen the OPENFILER threads for NAS, but I want to know how can we use NFS for hosting virtual machines? What I am thinking is that Use the primary partions for the ESX 3.5 and make the secondary partion as NFS share and use it as for this reason, please guide me if it works or not?

[Ken_Cline]

Check out LeftHand Networks Virtual SAN Appliance

Ken Cline

Technical Director, Virtualization

Wells Landers

VMware Communities User Moderator

[Berniebgf]

WIth regards to "Primary Volumes" are you talking about the "primary virtual Disk" for the Virtual machines?

If so, it would need to be on storage visable to both ESX server to be Vmotioned. (along with the secondary volume)

regards

Bernie.

http://sanmelody.blogspot.com

[smkrt]

Dear Berniebgf,

SANmelody is only available for 30 days trial. I need a permanat solution.

Thanks for your answer, no doubt its a great product to go for.

[Berniebgf]

Yeah, its not free

Bernie

[weinstein5]

You can use NAS/NFS as your shared storage which will allow you to vmotion/DRS and HA - check out check out page 125 of

[Ken_Cline]

What I am thinking is that Use the primary partions for the ESX 3.5 and make the secondary partion as NFS share and use it as for this reason, please guide me if it works or not?

If you take this route, make sure you don't put the NFS server in the service console. You'll get MUCH better performance (and security) if you allocate the additional space to a VMFS volume and then use a VM to share out your NFS space.

Ken Cline

Technical Director, Virtualization

Wells Landers

VMware Communities User Moderator