For a client i'm investigating a KVM or ESXi setup with 3 nodes and a SAN. A relatively budget SAN based on Freenas and ZFS.
(haven't decided on NFS or iSCSI yet, NFS is more flexible but iSCSI has slightly better write speeds)
It wil be hosting 7 VMs of which 5 windows server 2008 (AD, Exchange, SQL, 2x variuos applications) and 2 linux (webserver, Elastix VOIP)
KVM isn't the best for windows virtualization, but it is what i know best (but always had it with local storage)
Anyway i've been reading a lot about ZFS and Freenas and have come to the following setup for a SAN:
16x 15k 300GB SAS disk 2,5 inch
2x IBM M1015
2x Intel 320 SSD 80GB MLC mirrored for SLOG (4 GB partition, the rest unused)
SuperMicro X9SRi-3F socket 2011
Intel Xeon E5-2630 (6-core 2.3 Ghz)
64GB RAM (4x 16GB, still 4 slots unused)
HP NC364T Quad Port Gigabit NIC (intel)
My questions then:
with 64 GB RAM, will i still really profit from a L2ARC SSD? (Intel 320 160GB or something?)
What if i up the memory to 128 GB?
Is the SLOG perhaps unnecessary for only 7 VMs? (it will probably grow to 10 or perhaps 15 VMs in time)
Or is a Intel 313 SSD a better choice? it's a 20 GB SLC drive, but does not have "Enhanced Power Loss Data Protection" (to preserve data in case of powerloss if i understand correctly)
For the SAS disks would 2,5 inch or 3,5 inch SAS make a difference? 3,5 inch SAS disks are considerably cheaper (145 versus 255 euro each)
Would a pool of 8 mirrors be best for IOPS, or 2 RAIDZ2 arrays? The latter seems safer in that 2 disks in 1 array may fail without direct data loss.
The Supermicro motherboard has a 8x SAS SCU onboard, i can't find out much about it. Can i use it for ZFS?
It also has a new Intel C606 chipset, is it supported by the latest FreeNAS?
Is the processor perhaps too much?
I hope someone can help me out, i can't really justify buying the stuff just to test if it wil work
(haven't decided on NFS or iSCSI yet, NFS is more flexible but iSCSI has slightly better write speeds)
It wil be hosting 7 VMs of which 5 windows server 2008 (AD, Exchange, SQL, 2x variuos applications) and 2 linux (webserver, Elastix VOIP)
KVM isn't the best for windows virtualization, but it is what i know best (but always had it with local storage)
Anyway i've been reading a lot about ZFS and Freenas and have come to the following setup for a SAN:
16x 15k 300GB SAS disk 2,5 inch
2x IBM M1015
2x Intel 320 SSD 80GB MLC mirrored for SLOG (4 GB partition, the rest unused)
SuperMicro X9SRi-3F socket 2011
Intel Xeon E5-2630 (6-core 2.3 Ghz)
64GB RAM (4x 16GB, still 4 slots unused)
HP NC364T Quad Port Gigabit NIC (intel)
My questions then:
with 64 GB RAM, will i still really profit from a L2ARC SSD? (Intel 320 160GB or something?)
What if i up the memory to 128 GB?
Is the SLOG perhaps unnecessary for only 7 VMs? (it will probably grow to 10 or perhaps 15 VMs in time)
Or is a Intel 313 SSD a better choice? it's a 20 GB SLC drive, but does not have "Enhanced Power Loss Data Protection" (to preserve data in case of powerloss if i understand correctly)
For the SAS disks would 2,5 inch or 3,5 inch SAS make a difference? 3,5 inch SAS disks are considerably cheaper (145 versus 255 euro each)
Would a pool of 8 mirrors be best for IOPS, or 2 RAIDZ2 arrays? The latter seems safer in that 2 disks in 1 array may fail without direct data loss.
The Supermicro motherboard has a 8x SAS SCU onboard, i can't find out much about it. Can i use it for ZFS?
It also has a new Intel C606 chipset, is it supported by the latest FreeNAS?
Is the processor perhaps too much?
I hope someone can help me out, i can't really justify buying the stuff just to test if it wil work