Can shares be used to prioritize CPU contention without setting up pools?

[OPDBA]

In other words, in general, if I have a slightly overcommitted (say 2:1) in CPU on a small cluster of hosts, can I engage shares to create a simple 2 or three tier situation to prioritize in a contention scenario? Or do you have to create a pool? And if I have to create a pool can I just create one pool of basically all resources?

TLDR: Would this work as a simple way to prioritize if contention occurs without getting into a more complicated pool situation?

Thanks!

[scott28tt]

Yes you can.

The cluster is considered to be the “root resource pool”, so you would be managing contention within it by adjusting your VM shares.

[depping]

As Scott mentioned, yes you can. Just look at the shares assigned to the vCPUs as shown in the screenshot below and change accordingly for the VMs where needed.