ESXi + Nexenta + Passthrough did it work

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
5,792
113
Yes it did. I will probably have some articles on Nexenta soon.
 

L3R4F

New Member
Dec 31, 2010
17
3
3
Hello
Using a raid controller is the only way to get the "disk passthrough" function? I know it won't work with software raid, but can I have direct access to a single disk from a VM?
 

gea

Well-Known Member
Dec 31, 2010
3,141
1,182
113
DE
esxi + virtualized Nexenta/ Solaris + pci-passthrough

Yes, this is a stable config. i use it on several machines without problem.

Some short suggestions:
You should use a intel mainboard with 3420 or 5520 chipset, enable vti-d on it and you need an extra SAS/Sata controller (best are LSI 1068e or LSI 2008 based ones in it-mode) for pci-passthrough. Esxi and Nexenta/Solaris could be stored on your local sata boot-drive (ahci required). All other disks are connected to your SAS controller and managed from Nexenta/ Solaris.

You should also have enough ram (best 4gb+ for Nexenta/Solaris + ram for your vm's) and install vmware tools, then set this vm to autostart first. share your pool then via NFS and import it in esxi. Store your other VM's on this NFS datastore. Share it also via cifs for easy move/ copy/ backup or zfs snapshot access from windows.
If you need esxi hot-snap capability, do a esxi snapshot, then a zfs snapshot. After this you could delete the esxi snapshot. In case of problems, you could revert to your zfs snap and restore the hot-snap within esxi.

more infos about my config, see http://napp-it.org/napp-it/all-in-one/index_en.html

gea
 

odditory

Moderator
Dec 23, 2010
381
59
28
My only prob with NexentaStor is it maxes out at 18Tb. So far Solaris Express 11 is seeming a little more promising for me anyway, assuming they don't start charging for the "test" use.

NexentaStor has the best GUI of the bunch by far though.
 
Last edited:

fagiano

Member
Feb 5, 2011
43
7
8
Singapore
I use NexentaCore, no 18 TB limit but no built in admin UI. If you mind the lack of UI you can try napp-it. Personally I thought the lack of UI would be a problem, but now I'm actually happy I chosen to not use any. Just create a few common scripts in your home dir (stuff like createshare etc...) and SSH becomes faster than using any fancy Web interface.

ciao
Alberto
 

gea

Well-Known Member
Dec 31, 2010
3,141
1,182
113
DE
I use NexentaCore, no 18 TB limit but no built in admin UI. If you mind the lack of UI you can try napp-it. Personally I thought the lack of UI would be a problem, but now I'm actually happy I chosen to not use any. Just create a few common scripts in your home dir (stuff like createshare etc...) and SSH becomes faster than using any fancy Web interface.

ciao
Alberto
i have have added a part 2 of my mini Howo:

All-In-One Server
ESXi 4.1 with a virtualized OpenIndiana ZFS NAS/SAS Server

first draft copy:
http://www.napp-it.org/doc/downloads/all-in-one.pdf


with Nexenta its quite similar beside the following:
install vmware-tools:
apt-get install vmware.tools

Problem:
vmxnet3 network driver is currently not available in Nexenta tools

Gea