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VMware vSAN on Consumer-Grade SSDs - Endurance analysis

When you are running an ESXi based homelab, you might have considered using vSAN as the storage technology of choice. Hyperconverged storages are a growing alternative to SAN-based systems in virtual environments, so using them at home will help to improve your skillset with that technology.

To get started with vSAN you need at least 3 ESXi Hosts, each equipped with 2 drives. Alternatively, you can build a 2-node vSAN Cluster using a Raspberry Pi as a witness node.

VMware maintains a special HCL that lists supported drives to be used with vSAN. In production setups, it is very important to use certified hardware. Using non-enterprise hardware might result in data loss and bad performance caused by the lack of power loss protection and small caches.

This article takes a look at consumer-grade SSDs and their durability to be used with vSAN. Please be aware that non-certified hardware should only be used in homelabs or for demo purposes. Do not place sensitive data on vSAN that is running on consumer hardware.

Read More »VMware vSAN on Consumer-Grade SSDs - Endurance analysis

ESXi with USB NIC for vSAN and Storage - A Good Idea?

About a month ago, the USB Native Driver Fling has added support for 2.5 Gbit Network adapters. Until then it was clear that the embedded network interface is faster and more stable, compared to a 1Gbit USB Network adapter. I've never used a USB NIC for storage or management traffic.

With the support of 2.5GBASE-T network adapters, I wondered if it is a good idea to use them for accessing shared storage or for vSAN traffic.

It is obvious that a 2.5 Gbit adapter has a higher bandwidth, but due to the USB overhead, there should be a penalty to latency. But how bad will it be? To figure out the impact, I did some testing.

Read More »ESXi with USB NIC for vSAN and Storage - A Good Idea?

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 6 - Troubleshooting

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version.

The sixth part is about troubleshooting vSAN deployments.

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 6 - Troubleshooting

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 5 - Performance Service

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version.

In the fifth part, I'm working with commands related to the vSAN performance service. These commands are used to enable and configure the vSAN Performance Service and gather performance related information.

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 5 - Performance Service

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 4 - Cluster Health

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version.

In the fourth part, I'm working with commands related to the vSAN health plugin. These commands are only available when the Health Services are installed.

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 4 - Cluster Health

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 3 - Object Management

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version.

The third part explains commands related to the object management in vSAN. These commands are used for troubleshooting or reconfiguration of objects. They also provide an insight on how vSAN works.

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 3 - Object Management

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 2 - Cluster-Administration

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version.

The second part explains commands related to vSAN cluster administration tasks. These commands are required to gather information about ESXi hosts and the cluster itself. They also provide important information when you want to maintain your vSAN cluster or configure a stretched cluster:

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 2 - Cluster-Administration

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 1 - Basic Configuration

vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide

The "vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide" series explains how to manage your VMware Virtual SAN environment with the Ruby vSphere Console. RVC is an interactive command line tool to control and automate your platform. If you are new to RVC, make sure to read the Getting Started with Ruby vSphere Console Guide. All commands are from the latest vSAN 6.6 version. The first part explains basic configuration tasks that are required for the initial setup:

Read More »vSAN 6.6 RVC Guide Part 1 - Basic Configuration

How to silence VMware vSAN Health Checks

A new feature in vSAN 6.6 is the ability to silence Health Checks. In previous versions, it was already possible to disable alerts that are triggered by health checks. Silencing health checks is one step further and enables you to have a clean vSAN health. Silenced checks are displayed with a green checkmark and are marked as "Skipped".

Especially for home labs, where unsupported hardware is used, this is a great feature.

Read More »How to silence VMware vSAN Health Checks