Best vdev / zpool / drive congfiguraiton for VMware ESXi storage

[curruscanis]

Hello, I have been researching various solutions using FreeNAS for ESXi VM storage and the more posts I read the more confused I am getting as I am seeing multiple solutions to various issues and not quite what I am looking for. I think my questions is fairly straight forward so if someone can please answer I woudl be very pleased.

If I have a 24 bay chassis, using 2TB ( or larger, all the same ) Western Digital Pro RED drives, what is the best vdev / zpool / drive configuraiton for optimal performance when used only for iSCSI access from multiple VMware hosts? Total space is less important than performance, more space can be gained by using larger drives if needed.


I plan on using multiple Intel p3700 or equivelent cards for SLOG and L2ARC
512GB RAM
All access will be over 10GB links

Thank you all for your assistance.

 

[Zredwire]

The best performance for VM storage would be mirrored Vdevs all in a single pool. For Freenas pools, with ESXI, the best performance is had if you have 50% of your space free (so with mirrored VDEVs and 50% full your looking at 25% storage utilization). Personally if I were you I would set sync = always on the Pool and get a fast SLOG.

 

[wreedps]

How did this work out? I am interested.