Three theoretical questions from newbie

[olegarr]

Hello:

I have three theoretical questions from newbie…

1. I’m going to manually install ESX and I do not have too much space, so what is the minimum size for partition /boot, / and swap? I found only recommended sizes (100MB, 2560MB and 544MB), but could not find minimum…

2. If I have VC and License Server installed on the same box and ESX resides on another side of firewall should I open port 27000 on my firewall for connection between ESX and License Server? Or just open port 902 for communication between VC and ESX will be good enough?

3. As usual Virtual disk it’s juts one single vm.vmdk file… Is there any other way/format for keeping virtual disks? For example set of files, file + something and etc…

Thank you very much for your help.

[bertdb]

1. minimal configuration is dangerous because things like log files can grow.

/boot should really be 100 MB, swap can be reduced to 200 or 300 MB without problem. For /, the recommended size in the installer is 5 GB, so 2560MB is a reduced value already.

2. You'll need the license server port as well.

3. every virtual disk on ESX consists of 2 files: a small description file ( about 400 bytes) and a large "contents" file, of the full disk size (10 GB disk = 10 GB contents file). You can export these files to other formats, but ESX can't use them in those formats directly. To export, you'll have to use vmkfstools on the command line of the service console.

[olegarr]

bertdb,

Thanks for the help.

are you talking about vm-flat.vmdk and vm.vmdk files?

Thanks

[MR-T]

Yes, he is.

[Jwoods]

Just curious, how much space are you working with? Local disk or san?

[olegarr]

I just trying to find out what is the minimum requirements for this partitions....

[bertdb]

Yes, I am

[MR-T]

Thought so.

[olegarr]

regarding firewall... if I understand correctly I need to open ports 902 and 27000, plust 903 if I want to connect to ESX directly from VI Client...

Is it correct?

Thanks

[bertdb]

this is fully documented in http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_server_config.pdf

around page 183 in the current version.