Im currently running an 'all-in-one' ESXi 6.5 build where my storage tier is a quasi-san but all built into the existing host. The VM root file-system is a VMDK housed on one of the SSD datastores and then I have 4 HDD's passed through to the NAS OS via RDM. The HDDs are setup as a RAID10 array.
However, Im really wondering if I should perhaps look at offloading that VM (right now I have 8GB RAM and 2 cores allocated to it) to free up some resources for my other ideas on the actual compute side by building a small NAS. Part of me would like to go crazy and get a Xeon D but thats probably overkill. A low powered quad core (seems like the Celeron/Pentium line-up is strong enough) can be had for minimal cost along with a case from the folks at U-NAS. I'd simply transfer over my existing 4 drives to that setup and be done.
The only other thing that I'd be concerned about is performance across the wire for read/write. Right now I'm getting REALLY good read/write on the HDDs and while I can absolutely stand to lose a little performance (Im not running a production network here...its just my home lab) I dont want to back myself into a corner if I have 5 VMs accessing the NAS NFS datastore at the same time. Granted, I dont have alot of systems that would require extremely high IOPs but trying to reduce hiccuping where I can.
I recently just read a post by a homelabber regarding using infiniband NICs to connect his new home NAS with his server and that seemed to reap positive results and the cost was right too so that was one other thing I would be looking at if building a remote NAS for the ESXi system.
At the end of the day, I'm still pretty green when it comes to all this stuff so be gentle Just wanting to have a good resilient setup that isn't going to blow away the bank. Thanks all!
However, Im really wondering if I should perhaps look at offloading that VM (right now I have 8GB RAM and 2 cores allocated to it) to free up some resources for my other ideas on the actual compute side by building a small NAS. Part of me would like to go crazy and get a Xeon D but thats probably overkill. A low powered quad core (seems like the Celeron/Pentium line-up is strong enough) can be had for minimal cost along with a case from the folks at U-NAS. I'd simply transfer over my existing 4 drives to that setup and be done.
The only other thing that I'd be concerned about is performance across the wire for read/write. Right now I'm getting REALLY good read/write on the HDDs and while I can absolutely stand to lose a little performance (Im not running a production network here...its just my home lab) I dont want to back myself into a corner if I have 5 VMs accessing the NAS NFS datastore at the same time. Granted, I dont have alot of systems that would require extremely high IOPs but trying to reduce hiccuping where I can.
I recently just read a post by a homelabber regarding using infiniband NICs to connect his new home NAS with his server and that seemed to reap positive results and the cost was right too so that was one other thing I would be looking at if building a remote NAS for the ESXi system.
At the end of the day, I'm still pretty green when it comes to all this stuff so be gentle Just wanting to have a good resilient setup that isn't going to blow away the bank. Thanks all!