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    <title>topic Re: Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10 in ESXi Discussions</title>
    <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730815#M269306</link>
    <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;P&gt;&amp;gt;&amp;gt; I would use the Thick Provision Eager Zeroed to avoid fragmentation within the datastore&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&amp;gt; Where did you get idea *this* helps to avoid fragmentation???&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;Thick provisioned vmdks do indeed help to avoid fragmented datastores. With thick provisioned you usually get 1 upto a few hundred fragments. Thin provisioned vmdks often consist of ten thousands of fragments.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 02 May 2016 19:50:31 GMT</pubDate>
    <dc:creator>continuum</dc:creator>
    <dc:date>2016-05-02T19:50:31Z</dc:date>
    <item>
      <title>Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10</title>
      <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730812#M269303</link>
      <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;P&gt;I know this has been asked several times,but I have never seen any definitive answer to this question.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;In my raid controllers [ LSI-8704EM2 / LSI-8708EM2 ] I can set the &lt;STRONG&gt;Strip&lt;/STRONG&gt; size to get the required &lt;STRONG&gt;Stripe&lt;/STRONG&gt; size by multiplying this with the amount of drives.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;VMFS5 is using a &lt;STRONG&gt;1MB block size&lt;/STRONG&gt;, so with my 4 drives configuration, I would need to set my &lt;STRONG&gt;Strip&lt;/STRONG&gt; size to 256KB, for my 8 drives it would be 128KB.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;When I create a new VM I would use the Thick Provision Eager Zeroed to avoid fragmentation within the datastore, I believe this would be the optimal situation in regards the datastore?&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;Would the OS [Linux] in the VM undo this theory?&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;Any advise or feedback?&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 27 Apr 2016 19:04:10 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730812#M269303</guid>
      <dc:creator>Wabun</dc:creator>
      <dc:date>2016-04-27T19:04:10Z</dc:date>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Re: Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10</title>
      <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730813#M269304</link>
      <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;BLOCKQUOTE&gt;
&lt;P&gt;I have never seen any definitive answer to this question.&lt;/P&gt;
&lt;/BLOCKQUOTE&gt;&lt;P&gt;Probably because there is no definite answer to this question.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;BLOCKQUOTE&gt;
&lt;P&gt;In my raid controllers [ LSI-8704EM2 / LSI-8708EM2 ]&lt;/P&gt;
&lt;/BLOCKQUOTE&gt;&lt;P&gt;You can win more performance when you switch your old sata/3gbit controller for sata/6gbit one.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;BLOCKQUOTE&gt;
&lt;P&gt;VMFS5 is using a 1MB block size&lt;/P&gt;
&lt;/BLOCKQUOTE&gt;&lt;P&gt;True, but vmfs5 is also using 8kB sub-blocks. Moreover, very small files (&amp;lt;1kB) can be stored in meta-data.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;BLOCKQUOTE&gt;
&lt;P&gt;I would use the Thick Provision Eager Zeroed to avoid fragmentation within the datastore&lt;/P&gt;
&lt;/BLOCKQUOTE&gt;&lt;P&gt;Where did you get idea *this* helps to avoid fragmentation???&lt;/P&gt;&lt;BLOCKQUOTE&gt;
&lt;P&gt;I believe this would be the optimal situation in regards the datastore?&lt;/P&gt;
&lt;/BLOCKQUOTE&gt;&lt;P&gt;I do not believe this would be optimal, and I'm not sure there is some generally optimal value. Setting strip-size equal to vmfs5 block-size might not be the best option, because it is quite small. Moreover, there are other things you should consider, i.e.:&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- hard-drive sector size (mostly 512B or 4kB)&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- ssd read/erase block size (highly vendor-specific)&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- VM filesystem sector/block size (depends on OS)&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- VM filesystem load (depends on what your VM is doing)&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- size of your raid-controller's on-board cache&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- type of raid-array (0,1,10,5,6,...)&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;- etc, etc&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;IMHO, if you do not have time for testing, just stick with default value. With blind shot you can just make things worse...&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 29 Apr 2016 07:19:45 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730813#M269304</guid>
      <dc:creator>JarryG</dc:creator>
      <dc:date>2016-04-29T07:19:45Z</dc:date>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Re: Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10</title>
      <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730814#M269305</link>
      <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;P&gt;Hiya, &lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;thanks ever so much for your reply, much appreciated.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;If we initialize the raid aren't all blocks [Strip] on the disks that size? no matter how VMware or other OS within the VM uses it?&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;I would need to do some real world testing like you said.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 29 Apr 2016 10:00:59 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730814#M269305</guid>
      <dc:creator>Wabun</dc:creator>
      <dc:date>2016-04-29T10:00:59Z</dc:date>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Re: Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10</title>
      <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730815#M269306</link>
      <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;P&gt;&amp;gt;&amp;gt; I would use the Thick Provision Eager Zeroed to avoid fragmentation within the datastore&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;&amp;gt; Where did you get idea *this* helps to avoid fragmentation???&lt;/P&gt;&lt;P&gt;Thick provisioned vmdks do indeed help to avoid fragmented datastores. With thick provisioned you usually get 1 upto a few hundred fragments. Thin provisioned vmdks often consist of ten thousands of fragments.&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 02 May 2016 19:50:31 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730815#M269306</guid>
      <dc:creator>continuum</dc:creator>
      <dc:date>2016-05-02T19:50:31Z</dc:date>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Re: Strip size in Raid Controller with ESXi servers - RAID 10</title>
      <link>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730816#M269307</link>
      <description>&lt;HTML&gt;&lt;HEAD&gt;&lt;/HEAD&gt;&lt;BODY&gt;&lt;P&gt;Clear, but I was wondering about that "eager zeroed" part...&lt;/P&gt;&lt;/BODY&gt;&lt;/HTML&gt;</description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 03 May 2016 10:17:22 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://communities.vmware.com/t5/ESXi-Discussions/Strip-size-in-Raid-Controller-with-ESXi-servers-RAID-10/m-p/2730816#M269307</guid>
      <dc:creator>JarryG</dc:creator>
      <dc:date>2016-05-03T10:17:22Z</dc:date>
    </item>
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