Vmotion and Nas, is it possible ?

[zemotard]

Hi I wish to install a low cost solution with vmware.

So is it possible to use vmotion, when VM are stored on a nas ?

Regards

[Julio_V_]

Yes it is.

Be aware though that the VM overall performance will be slow, regardless of VMotion, if you put it in a NAS.

Have a look at the basics in http://www.vmware.com/products/vi/vc/vmotion.html

JV.

[zemotard]

Ok, so is it possible to use a file server as storage server in order to host vm and to use vmotion ?

Anyone has an experience with NAS /file server installation ?

Regards

[oreeh]

If you really want a cheap solution put an iSCSI target on top of the fileserver / a dedicated iSCSI server.

[stvkpln]

Transferring to/from NAS (i.e. NFS v3 TCP, NFS over UDP and CIFS is \*NOT* supported and does not work) can be very slow, but once it's up and working, performance is reasonable for a few low utilization VM's. I store all of my ISO files and Templates on an NFS datastore housed on a NetApp filer for various reasons, and when I run updates to them, for the most part, things run at a reasonable pace. However, deploying from template is obviously slower than using a SAN (FC or iSCSI) based source.

[Texiwill]

Hello,

If your netapp allows multiple network connections you can load balance the load as well as setup multiple paths to different NFS shares that should help with performance.

But in general NAS is a good but slowish data store. Remember on network you can only achieve 70% of the rated speed. On fibre I believe it is much higher and either 2 or 4 Gbps.... Where 1 Gbps network is really 700Mbps. Until 10G is supportable across the board. NAS will be slower. The same is true for iSCSI.

Best regards,

Edward

[taylorb · Accepted solution]

Just to clarify:

Yes VMotion and HA/DRS functions are supported and available on NAS with NFS shares. If you want to run it off a file server, the only supported software NFS is from Redhat. So if you build a fast Redhat box with some decent disk, you can use that as your shared storage. If you have a specific NAS appliance, you will need to look on the HCL to see if VMware likes it. Like others have said, you are going to get pretty low performance numbers. If you purchase enough hardware to make NFS perform well, then you will have spent enough money to buy a basic ISCSI San, which will likely run better.

[Michelle_Laveri]

Just to clarify:

If you want to run

it off a file server, the only supported software NFS

is from Redhat.

Is that true?

Is that somewhere in PDF or KB article?

Regards

Mike

[taylorb]

If you look at the San compatibilty guide (the HCL for ESX storage) @ http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_san_guide.pdf

Under NAS, it only lists 2 options for a server based NAS, RHEL3 and Fedora Core 4. I know lots of people have other distros and even MS services for UNix NFS working, but to me it looks like only Redhat is supported as a software NAS.