Do All vSAN Nodes need SSD ?

[wyldkao]

Hi All

     I want to testing VSAN in  my lab, but My 3 testing server only 1 SSD, other 2 servers just SATA HD...if I just testing VSAN function...Could I test in such hardware ??

and then I want to ask if I only use non-RAID HD...VSAN work ?

thanks!!

wyldkao

[crosdorff]

Yes, you need a least 3 servers with 1 disk group. Each diskgroup consisting off one ssd and one harddisk.

You might mark a harddisk as ssd for test purposes.

See Faking an SSD in your virtualized vSphere lab - Yellow Bricks for the command details.

Using non-raid disks is preferred. You could make 1 disk raid-0 sets as an alternative.

See VMware Compatibility Guide: vsan for the list off compatible io controllers.

[depping]

yes you can test it without SSD, see the article I wrote above, but this is not supported and NOT recommend for production!!

[vThinkBeyondVM]

Yes. Its possible. We can tag Non-SSD as SSD by using commands and use it. In my test environment I always do the same fake tagged SSD.

[wyldkao]

Hi All

   Thanks all replies.

Yes, I had build Fake-SSD in my other 2 servers, so My 3 servers has one SATA HD and one SSD.

But I do the Disk Management in VSAN...it show All My disk in 3 server could not be used.

My testing lab:one server install USB disk, other 2 server install esxi in the SATA Disk..but All Server node get the same result

Which step I misconfigure let the issue occur ?

thanks

[wyldkao]

HI

    I think about another thing....Whether All HD & SSD that vSAN used could not be format and be any datastore or not ?? My mean these disk must be empty disk status for VSAN use , right ??

wyldkao

[crosdorff]

Yes, your disks for vsan should be absolutely empty.

[depping]

yes you should empty them out. I use "gparted" iso for it... works like a charm. But you could also use partedUtil which is included in the ESXi shell