Question about NFS performance on Vsphere 4

[deeztech69]

I have tried to find an answer to this question but I have been unable to. So, I'll just ask here and hopefully someone can shed some light on it. I have a 3 vmware vsphere 4 hosts in a cluster which in turn I want to connect to 2 linux NFS SAS based servers. We have about 30 vm guests. I was thinking I should create a separate NFS export for each vm guest on the NFS server that each machine is supposed to go to and then create a separate storage on the ESX host to each one of those separate exports and bring up each machine on its respective storage. So, instead of having one big NFS export on each NFS server and in turn one big ESX storage to that export I just separate each machine to their own export/storage for performance/management reasons. Is this a recommended way of doing this? Is it going to hurt anything? Is it going to make a difference at all? I seem to remember reading something about sepearating NFS traffic across multiple NFS stores for each machine a couple of years ago, but I can't seem to find that article anymore.

Also, on an almost related topic, I'm thinking that connecting to an NFS export from the ESX host using the NFS server IP address vs. the NFS server host name would be preferred so that a DNS failure won't cause issues with the ESX storage. Is this a fair assumption and/or recommended way of doing this?

I would appreciate your help in answering any of these topics.

Thanks

[rManic]

crating separate nfs datastore for each vM will not improve the performance over single datastore

more over it will create additional administrative burden.

it is better to create fewer datastore.

you can use any of the method eithe IP or Name, but in a corporate infrastructure it is montatory to have reduntant DNS.

I will recoment to use name

regards

Manic

[deeztech69]

Thanks for answering my NFS performance question. Redundant DNS or not, it seems to me the SAFEST way to connect to NFS is over the IP so DNS is not a factor whatsoever. Unless it somehow affects vsphere in any way, why introduce a point of possible failure?

[rManic]

yes you are right?

then go with IP

regards

Manic

[jpdicicco]

Name resolution was introduced specifically to ease management and make settings more understandable. If you use a name in your settings, then you have the dual advantage of a meaningful value (e.g. NFS-HQ-DAS1) and easier management when you need to change what the name points to (you change it in 1 place, and it is automatically used everywhere).

So, I recommend DNS. If you're skittish about using DNS, then I would use the hosts file on the service console. You'll still have to change the mapping on each host when/if you change the IP of your NFS target, but you can use a meaningful name that may help you down the road.

Happy virtualizing!

JP

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