Help me interpret this storage performance data...

[Jaknell1011]

I have an ESXi host connected to FreeNAS using NFS. I just created a new VM and ran HD Tune on it to see how ESXi+NFS compares to my physical server. Can someone help me interpret this data and tell me how these two match up? I already have my opinions on it but I would like a few "second opinions" to get a general consensus on how this looks to perform. The goal is to actually virtualize the physical server, but I am not sure NFS has the performance capability to do this.

First test - physical server C: drive:

Second Test - physical server D: (Storage) drive:

Third Test - virtual server C: (only) drive:

So what do you think? Can this ESXi setup function strongly enough to virtualize this server? It will be used as the network storage server for network shares and drives. Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[Jaknell1011]

No input on this yet?

I thought people would love to give an opinion based on already provided test results. I know there is MUCH more to this for true performance but I would be curious to hear if I should even bother getting any deeper into this with NFS.

 

[cyberjock]

I don't even understand what the heck you are doing. You've thrown some benchmark screenshots up, but there's no info on what the heck you are trying to do or anything. I just closed it because it wasn't worth prying further. I'm guessing everyone else did the exact same thing. We don't want to pull teeth just to help someone.

I will tell you that a single benchmark isn't going to be useful at all. What you really should do is read up on people that have used NFS with ESXi and notice the hardware they needed on the server. Most needed 32GB of RAM(and if you want to run multiple VMs you may need much more), many needed an l2arc and a zil along with a fast processor. If money can't be spent on those then NFS isn't likely to work out for you.