Which RAID Controller for DL380 G7 as HomeLab?

[Benten93]

Hello everyone,

this is my first post in this forum and i am looking forward that some of you might help me do decide.

I've got an HP DL380G7 (with LFF Bays) and want to populate him as a ESXi Host with an Windows Server 2012 R2 Guest as a DC and Storage Server for my home lab and several testing Guests.

For Storage i have 4 new WD RED 5TB NAS Hard Drives.
As Host-Drive i bought 2 Intel 730 480GB.

Now i dont know which is the best way to get the System running.

The Onboard Raid Controller (P410i) does not have an Cache Module yet.
If i am correct, i could create a Raid 1 of the SSDs and a Raid 10 for the Storage.
But is it a good way to handle a Storage Server based VMFS? (I would create Virtual Drives which i would add to the Windows Server)
I guess the performance would be awful, right? If i add the BBWC 512M or 1GB to the P410i does it help much?
Further i think the Backplane of the LFF Bay only supports Sata 2 (3Gbit/s) so i would never get the max Performance off the SSDs..

Another way would be to get a seperate Raid Controller to passtrough to the Windows Server and attach the 4 WD Reds or the two SSDs to this controller.
I took a look at the P420 and the LSI 9260-8i or the LSI 9271-8i (its newer and has PCI-E 3, for future).
Which one would you take? If i take one of the LSI's, does the Server gets much louder? I heard of HP doenst like Non-HP Expansion Cards.

I would really appreciate if anyone could give me some hints how i get the best performance out of this server.

Thanks,

Benten93

 

[Lost-Benji]

I've got an HP DL380G7 (with LFF Bays) and want to populate him as a ESXi Host with an Windows Server 2012 R2 Guest as a DC and Storage Server for my home lab and several testing Guests.

1. The Onboard Raid Controller (P410i) does not have an Cache Module yet.
2. If i am correct, i could create a Raid 1 of the SSDs and a Raid 10 for the Storage.
3. But is it a good way to handle a Storage Server based VMFS? (I would create Virtual Drives which i would add to the Windows Server)
4. I guess the performance would be awful, right? If i add the BBWC 512M or 1GB to the P410i does it help much?
5. Further i think the Backplane of the LFF Bay only supports Sata 2 (3Gbit/s) so i would never get the max performance off the SSDs.

1. Get one, get battery too if you don't run a good UPS (not a cheap PoS).
2. Yes.
3. See Note below.
4. The HP RAID solution is actually fast and good performer.
5. 3Gbit is more than fast enough for spinning media, SSD's are for Host only and you will not notice the slower speed.

Note: I am not a fan of ESX and fail to see the benefit here. You are going to run a Windows VM, you should already have a license key for such which will allow it to be used for the 2012R2 Host as well as two 2012R2 guests. This will yield best performance with least amount of issues.

 

[Benten93]

Thanks Lost-Benji for your answer!
I want ESXi as host because i want several testing guests besides the Windows Server. That includes Linux, FreeBSD and so on..

I will try to get a BBWC!

You Would say that a ~10TB vmfs as a Virtual Drive is nearly as fast as and additional Raid Controller with passtrough?

Im not really sure if i get your note correct.. You Would take the Windows Server as Host? With Hyper-V?

 

[Lost-Benji]

1. Thanks Lost-Benji for your answer!
2. I want ESXi as host because i want several testing guests besides the Windows Server. That includes Linux, FreeBSD and so on..
3. I will try to get a BBWC!
4. You Would say that a ~10TB vmfs as a Virtual Drive is nearly as fast as and additional Raid Controller with passtrough?
5. Im not really sure if i get your note correct.. You Would take the Windows Server as Host? With Hyper-V?

1. No worries, I don't mind being a help in these forums, so many others are just full of arm-chair experts and KB warriors.
2. You do realise, all the other flavour OS's will run as guests on Hyper-V?
3. Not essential, the RAID card will do all features without it, the UPS gives the server a chance to shut down prior to power off.
4. I can't say on that, I don't pass RAID cards to guests. I prefer to keep all hardware on the Host, Guests just take what they are given, keeps it simple and stable. That being said, if you have a fast array (RAID-10) holding the VHD's, then you should not see too much issue. I would also not run massive VHD's either, if you want to pass multi-TB, then your idea of direct passing may work better for you. Test and see.
5. Yes, I am Windows man as it is the industry standard so it is in my interests to work with it thus keeps me in the game. Hyper-V works great for me and I love it.