How to use L2 cache with VMWare?

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rrbnc
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Nov 24, 2014 3:06 am

Thu Dec 18, 2014 2:40 pm

What is the proper way to present the SSD (for L2 cache) to the StarWind VM using VMWare ESXi? Do we just add a VMWare datastore to the SSD and add a virtual disk to the StarWind VM? Or is there a way to pass the SSD through to the VM, either using some passthrough method or RDM?

This also brings up the question: how does StarWind detect an SSD failure when using VMWare instead of Hyper-V (where the drive is native)?
thefinkster
Posts: 46
Joined: Thu Sep 18, 2014 7:15 pm

Thu Dec 18, 2014 4:14 pm

I would pass it through myself. My StarWind's are not virtual though; so I don't know the potential performance difference between VMDK on Datastore supplied to the VM or just supplying the raw drive to the VM for native use.

Here's a post on VMWare from v5.1 that suggests the difference is negligible. http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2013/01 ... s-rdm.html

So maybe I'd just do the Datastore with VMDK.
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Anatoly (staff)
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Mon Dec 22, 2014 7:10 pm

thefinkster wrote:
So maybe I'd just do the Datastore with VMDK.
+ to that from me!
Best regards,
Anatoly Vilchinsky
Global Engineering and Support Manager
www.starwind.com
av@starwind.com
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