Hi all,
I need to install a virtual machine acting as a virtual storage server under CentOS 5.x (using kvm, xen, virtualbox or vmware). This virtual storage machine needs to server storage to another ESXi server and at the same time to the host where is installed.
This is due to the limitations of hardware I have available. Both hosts needs to server several machines.
It is very important that the virtual machine consumes the least resources possible (host has 5GB RAM and i need to run three virtual machines minimum, including this storage server as a virtual machine).
What can be better solution: CentOS, NexentaStor, openfiler ...??
Many thaks.
My recomendation: Freenas... It´s a lightweight NAS with freebsd and work very well... I had installed 4 VM with KVM on CentOS 5.5. This Freenas VM server iSCSI storage to 4 VM with Windows 2008 R2 Cluster FailOver solution... I installed Freenas ´cause I was needed iSCSI with Persistent Reservation on it in order to deploy Cluster FailOver on MS WIndows 2008 R2...
I hope this can help you too...
Regards
2011/1/28 carlopmart carlopmart@gmail.com:
Hi all,
I need to install a virtual machine acting as a virtual storage server under CentOS 5.x (using kvm, xen, virtualbox or vmware). This virtual storage machine needs to server storage to another ESXi server and at the same time to the host where is installed.
This is due to the limitations of hardware I have available. Both hosts needs to server several machines.
It is very important that the virtual machine consumes the least resources possible (host has 5GB RAM and i need to run three virtual machines minimum, including this storage server as a virtual machine).
What can be better solution: CentOS, NexentaStor, openfiler ...??
Many thaks.
-- CL Martinez carlopmart {at} gmail {d0t} com _______________________________________________ CentOS-virt mailing list CentOS-virt@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos-virt
I need to install a virtual machine acting as a virtual storage server
under CentOS 5.x (using kvm, xen, virtualbox or vmware).
Back when I started using virtual machines, I used guests to share large storage.
Eventually, I found it was better to let the host do the sharing of storage, and let the guests connect to it.
Seems more efficient that way, as well as helping to facilitate backups and maintenance.
I may be wrong on this compdoc, but I'm pretty sure it's a pretty bad idea to have the host (Dom0 for me, in Xen) doing anything other than hosting the system for the DomUs.
As far as the 'best' setup for your NAS server, it really depends on how much you know about Linux. Openfiler is really nice, but it has some limitations on what you can do as far as access controls. I found it to be to coarse-grained for my uses. In some situations it would work without a problem, I'm sure. I would give it a close look, really. It is very easy to set up and works well.
I'm assuming you don't really know a lot more about Linux than I do because you are asking this question. It is really the same place I started. I have been looking at various solutions for quite a while.
The last time I looked at Openfiler you could only use the 32bit version as a DomU in Xen. I think they have other images for other virtualization platforms, and I know they have an image for VMWare.
FreeNAS really is nice, and I actually prefer the *BSDs to Linux, but depending on what you are looking for as far as ease of use and setup you may find it somewhat less refined than Openfiler. It is definitely not as 'pretty'.
I hope this helps.
compdoc wrote:
I need to install a virtual machine acting as a virtual storage server
under CentOS 5.x (using kvm, xen, virtualbox or vmware).
Back when I started using virtual machines, I used guests to share large storage.
Eventually, I found it was better to let the host do the sharing of storage, and let the guests connect to it.
Seems more efficient that way, as well as helping to facilitate backups and maintenance.
CentOS-virt mailing list CentOS-virt@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos-virt
I may be wrong on this compdoc, but I'm pretty sure it's a pretty bad idea
to have the host (Dom0 for me, in Xen) doing anything other than hosting the system for the DomUs.
Thanks for the reply, but someone else asked the question. I use KVM and the host isn't taxed to the point of needing to be strictly a host. One trick I've learned: have the OS, VMs, and large storage on separate physical drives, or it can choke.
This is also what helps facilitate backups and maintenance. For instance I can remove the OS drive, pop in a new drive and load a new OS and test the whole thing. If something goes south, I can reinstall the old OS drive and be up and running in a few minutes. If nothing goes wrong, I just hold the old drive for a while as backup, then recycle it in a new project at some point.
By the way, I've tried openfiler in a VM, (citrix zenserver or kvm) as well as on dedicated hardware. I found it would just stop responding and had to be rebooted after a few weeks of use. And this was with different versions of openfiler, since I keep thinking newer versions would fix the problems...
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carlopmart -
compdoc -
Gilberto Nunes -
Kelly Alger