HPE EVA Storage
1748123 Members
3375 Online
108758 Solutions
New Discussion

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

 
christose
Occasional Contributor

Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

Hello everybody.

I have recently bought from HP an MSA 2000G3 with SAS dual controller 6Gb and a C3000 Blade enclosure with 3 BL 460C G8 Blade servers. I have already created a private cloud with Microsoft System Center 2012 infrastructure for my company.  My considerations are about the maximum IOPS of the MSA 2000 and the maximum number of VMs that MSA 2000 can host. I know that MSA 2000 is a file based capacity storage and that my implementation isn’t the best for my hardware, but until now it is working flawlessly.  My configuration until now is the following:

 

VDISK1 :RAID 50 with 5 Volumes (1 Quorum and 4 Hyper-V Clustered Shared Volumes) currently hosting 32 Virtual Machines. The preferred owner of this VDISK is SAS Controller A

 

VDISK2 :RAID 5 with 4 Volumes (1 Quorum and 3 Hyper-V Clustered Shared Volumes) currently hosting 17 Virtual Machines. The preferred owner of this VDISK is SAS Controller B

 

By default every VDISK has its own preferred controller owner, but if one of the two controller shuts down, all the IO load will have to be served by one of the two controllers. The roles of the VMs that are served to my network are almost everything (Active directory, Exchange, SharePoint, SQL Guest Clusters, LINUX VMs).

 

So my question is what is the maximum load in VMs that one controller can stand. What I want to ask is what is the maximum number in Virtual machines that my MSA 2000 can host? 

7 REPLIES 7
CalvinZito
HPE Blogger

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

I don't know if it was a typo on your part or if someone gave you wrong information but the MSA 2000 G3 is not "file-based" but a block-based SAN array. 

 

Knowing how many virtual machines it could host is a very tough thing to estimate without knowing a lot about what those VMs you are running.  You'd need to know answers to questions like what are your IOPS and latency requirements for the VMs.  Not all VMs are created equal. 

 

Page 14 of the MSA QuickSpec provides some guidance on performance for a specific sized MSA so you might check that out. 

christose
Occasional Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

Thank you for your answer.

 

I had recently watched a web seminar from HP and the instructor told us that MSA P2000G3 is file based. Also the connectivity that we use (SAS) makes the storage a direct attached storage DAS and  it is not the best way to implement Hyper-V Failover cluster.

 

I understand what you are saying about the number of the VMs that I am running, and the role of each VM is also critical for the performance of the storage, but I need  to know what is the limit of the storage.

I have checked the storage settings in the web page and I can’t find any performance statistics, or any other indication showing me any kind of load.

 

What I need is a way to measure – find any potential performance issues and be able to predict the maximum number of VMS that are hosted on the storage.

 

Is it possible to have any kind of prediction about the maximum number of hosted VMs?

Is there a corresponding “formula” that I can use to calculate the IO load?

Torsten.
Acclaimed Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

>> Also the connectivity that we use (SAS) makes the storage a direct attached storage DAS and it is not the best way to implement Hyper-V Failover cluster.

It works perfectly redundant for 2 servers, but not more. It is still not a typical DAS like a simple disk chassis. But the requirement for 2 locations of the cluster servers cannot be met because of the cable limitations.
If you need more distance between the servers or connectivity for more servers, you should go for the FC or iSCSI models.
However, the P2000 remains a block level storage device.

Hope this helps!
Regards
Torsten.

__________________________________________________
There are only 10 types of people in the world -
those who understand binary, and those who don't.

__________________________________________________
No support by private messages. Please ask the forum!

If you feel this was helpful please click the KUDOS! thumb below!   
christose
Occasional Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

Torsten Thank you for your answer.

 

As you can see  from my description above I have already created a Hyper-V cluster with 3 HP Blades using the P2000 G3, and it is working so far.

 

So what are your recommendations for the future? Should I replace the  SAS Controllers with ISCSI of Fiber?

What I need to know is the maximum load in IO that one controller can have, so that I can calculate how many VMs to use.

 

Is it possible to find it somehow?

Torsten.
Acclaimed Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

Did you say blades?

Sorry.

So you have switches, no DAS at all.

Hope this helps!
Regards
Torsten.

__________________________________________________
There are only 10 types of people in the world -
those who understand binary, and those who don't.

__________________________________________________
No support by private messages. Please ask the forum!

If you feel this was helpful please click the KUDOS! thumb below!   
christose
Occasional Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

YES

Have a C3000 and a 2 SAS Mezzanines 6G

 

Check my fist post. 

Torsten.
Acclaimed Contributor

Re: Maximum number of Virtual Machines in MSA 2000 in SCVMM 2012 Private cloud

I have seen this meanwhile.

 

;-)

 

 

Witch switches the storages is not a DAS and can be shared between several blades like in FC or iSCSI, more or less. The only problem is the distance between rooms or buildings.

 

However.

 

The question how many VM can nobody really answer, because you can have a lot of VMs just sitting around doing nothing or only a few very busy.

 

I fully agree to the previous poster, the storage expert.


Hope this helps!
Regards
Torsten.

__________________________________________________
There are only 10 types of people in the world -
those who understand binary, and those who don't.

__________________________________________________
No support by private messages. Please ask the forum!

If you feel this was helpful please click the KUDOS! thumb below!