ESXi Server storage config

darkblade · 8 Jun 2017 at 18:18

Planning to install ESXi on an HP DL350P Gen 8 server, and am trying to figure out the best storage approach.

For the guest VM OSs I plan to utilse the following hardware in the server:
8 x 600GB 15K 12Gb/s connected to an HP Smart Array P340

For data storage:
Internal HP Smart Array P420 connected to an external SAS expander in a 24 drive bay case. The main usage of this will be for a file/media server to be managed by one of the VMs.

At the moment I'm thinking:
Boot ESXi from a USB stick.
Create a RAID 10 array on the P340 controller, then allocate this out to VMs via vSphere etc.

Not sure about the data storage.
One of the VMs will be doing P2P/torrent, and I will allocate a dedicated disk in the 24 bay case for this.
Otherwise, there will be 12 x 3TB drives to start with, with room for expansion. One of the VMs will run Ubuntu and will perform file sharing, streaming, Plex etc. What's the best approach for configuring the storage?

darkblade · 9 Jun 2017 at 01:54

I guess it would make sense to make use of the Smart Array's capability to support multiple logical drives and create an ESXi partition.

darkblade · 9 Jun 2017 at 07:01

I was originally planning on replacing the USB every 3 years as they do have limited writes. Had hoped that the BIOS would support mirroring of USB, but that's quite rare.

Still trying to figure out the best configuration for the large data storage array though.

darkblade · 9 Jun 2017 at 10:50

Useful suggestions - thanks.

I had been thinking of using RAID 6 for the main data store and just passing it as a raw device (as per your RDM comment).

Yes - this is getting slightly OTT. The server is going in a cupboard under the stairs (with PFSense router, switches, NVR, etc) that has an external vent with extractor fan (can also be switched to pump warm air back inside the house during the winter). This is intended to consolidate 4 machines that I have running 24/7 at the moment.

You make a good point about the electric costs - I may end up just keeping the DAS and swapping out the main server for something that isn't so thirsty. I guess running SSDs instead of the 15K drives would help - although the 15K drives are 2.5".