SSD for VM servers

Associate
Joined
4 Oct 2004
Posts
790
I currently have 4x Samsung 1gb f1's in raid 5 but running 4 or so server 2008 VM's I'm finding that disc time/queue is absolutely killing any performance. This is with a test environment which is just to help me pass my MCITP.

RAM (8gb) and CPU usage may be nearly idle but the discs are just thrashing around like crazy with IO actions.

I reckon SSD's are the answer since its all about seek time. I could really use 30 gb per server. The raid 5 will provide plenty of storage other wise but I could do with a 150gb odd drive to host the VM's themselves

Any recommendations as to which drive?

An SSD would indeed give some good performance for VM's?
 
Associate
Joined
13 Nov 2005
Posts
694
Location
Havant
Poor raid card perhaps? My 4 disk raid 5 runs 15+ machines without any issues using an adaptec 5405. Might be cheaper to uprate your card rather than splash out on ssd's.
 
Last edited:
Associate
OP
Joined
4 Oct 2004
Posts
790
adsyf - Not using ESX, Just VM Server

m_cozzy - Good point. I'm just using on board raid. 15+ machines sounds really impressive. I guess your not talking about standard 7200 sata disks?
 
Associate
Joined
13 Nov 2005
Posts
694
Location
Havant
Exactly the same drives as yourself.
It is my dedicated vmware box though running esxi, an ML110.
I do understand the slow performance issue as I used to be able to only run 4 or so vm's on a single disk under esxi at an acceptable speed.
It does sound like you would benefit from a proper hw raid card.. Your 4 disks would really fly then :).
 
Associate
OP
Joined
4 Oct 2004
Posts
790
Exactly the same drives as yourself.
It is my dedicated vmware box though running esxi, an ML110.
I do understand the slow performance issue as I used to be able to only run 4 or so vm's on a single disk under esxi at an acceptable speed.
It does sound like you would benefit from a proper hw raid card.. Your 4 disks would really fly then :).

What card are you using?
 
Associate
Joined
13 Nov 2005
Posts
694
Location
Havant
Already posted above, the adaptec 5405, as this is esxi compatible, cost about 300quid from memory.
If you are using vmware server under windows or linux then you will have a wider choice of cheaper hardware to use.
 
Associate
Joined
13 Nov 2005
Posts
694
Location
Havant
may as well just get a decent ssd instead if you're looking to spend that sort of money.

Well, it depends on required space doesn't it.

£300 for a 128gb ssd, so at a push 4 virtual machines @ 30gb each with no room for snapshots

OR

£300, or likely much less, rocketraid perhaps? I seem to remember they are cheap & fast, using raid5 with existing disks giving 3TB of space for vm's.
 
Soldato
Joined
11 Jul 2007
Posts
2,524
Still, an SSD would provide far greater performance than the array. I've got an 8 drive RAID5 on a hardware controller, but my SSD provides the far superior experience for running VM's.

This is just with VMWare for windows and one VM, with four SSD would have even more of an advantage.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
4 Oct 2004
Posts
790
Well the Kingston 64 GB V series can be had for £120. 3 of them would provide plently of storage and should have reasonable access times.

They don't suffer from stutter probs do they?
 
Back
Top Bottom