NetApp - The Virtual Storage Guy

VMware SRM 4.0 and NetApp SRA 1.4 Details

This week VMware and NetApp released new versions of SRM and the SRA which add support for vSphere and the rapidly expanding NFS install base. I'm sure many have questions regarding this much anticipated release and if you are one of these you are in luck! Yesterday our SRM expert Larry Touchette has published an in-depth post that covers the details, which can be found here.

A Follow-up on HP TechDay 2009 with an Invitation for You!

This week HP demonstrated several of their technology offerings to the storage community, and as a part of this event HP provided a hands on lab where attendees to 'kick the tires' of their storage technology offerings. As a part for this lab attendees were able to complete the same tasks with storage arrays and management tools from EMC and NetApp.

These types of educational experiences can really benefit the community by showcasing one’s enhancements and differentiation. I fully endorse these types of labs, sharing information empowers the user community and raises the bar in terms of what we must develop in order to remain an industry leader… except this isn’t what happened.

According to multiple tweets attendees were stating that tests designed to demonstrate storage integration with Windows systems and VMware were the command line interface and Filerview. This caught my attention as these aren't the tools NetApp recommends for our install base. A quick glance at a few of the sites covering the event confirmed the use of these legacy tools.

In fairness I need to highlight that HP did follow the steps provided in our storage best practices documents for VMware TR-3428 (VI3) and TR-3749 (vSphere). I would like to share with you that we are in the process of updating these documents with a goal of reducing their sizes by approximately 40%.

We hear the VMware community loud and clear - simplicity equates to scaling an environment.

VMware Communities Roundtable iSCSI Podcast is Live in iTunes

If missed joining us for the VMware Communities Podcast featuring the 'iSCSI Super Friends' you missed an excellent podcast. John shared with us that episode #66 set a new Communities Podcast record in terms of the number of attendees on the call.

Thru the magic of the 'interweb' you can can catch (and even subscribe to) the podcast via iTunes.

Major props to my partners in crime for making this podcast and accompanying blog post a reality: John Troyer and Andy Banta (VMware), Adam Carter (HP/Lefthand Networks), Eric Schott (Dell/EqualLogic), and Chad Sakac (EMC).

VMware Communities Roundtable Presents a Multivendor iSCSI Podcast

I am very pleased to share with you that on September 30th, you can join Andy Banta (VMware), Adam Carter (HP/Lefthand Networks), Eric Schott (Dell/EqualLogic), Chad Sakac (EMC), yours truly on the VMware Communities Roundtable Episode number 66 where we will be discussing our recent joint iSCSI blog post.

John Troyer has dubbed this episode ‘iSCSI Super Friends with EMC, NetApp, Dell, HP, & VMware’

A “Multivendor Post” on using iSCSI with VMware vSphere

One of the most popular posts we’ve ever done was the original ‘Multivendor Post’ to help our mutual iSCSI customers using VMware that focused on the operation of the software iSCSI initiator in ESX 3.5 with several iSCSI targets from multiple vendors. There’s been a lot of demand for a follow-up, so without further ado, here’s a multivendor collaborative effort on an update, which leverages extensively content from VMworld 2009 sessions TA2467 and TA3264. The post was authored by the following vendors and people: VMware (Andy Banta), EMC (Chad Sakac), Dell/EqualLogic (Eric Schott), HP/Lefthand Networks (Adam Carter), and NetApp.

One important note – in this post (and going forward we’ll be trying to do this consistently) all commands, configurations and features noted apply to vSphere ESX and ESXi equally. Command line formats are those used in when using the VMware vMA, which can be used with both ESX and ESXi. Alternate command line variants are possible when using the remote CLI or service console, but we’re standardizing on the vMA.

This post covers a broad spectrum of topics surrounding the main point (changes in, and configuration of the iSCSI software initiator in vSphere ESX/ESXi 4) including:

• Multipathing using NMP and the Pluggable Storage Architecture

• vmknic/vSwitch setup

• Subnet configuration

• Jumbo Frames

• Delayed Ack

• Other configuration recommendations

If this sounds interesting – or you’re a customer using (or one considering using) iSCSI and vSphere 4 read on!

vSphere on NetApp Book Available at VMworld

This morning the VMworld bookstore opened and for the first time NetApp customers are able purchase a NetApp technical book! Early reports state that sales have been solid, so if you’re interested in a copy I’d suggest you grab one soon. Should you miss your opportunity to grab one the books will be available for sale in the next few weeks on Amazon.com.

Meet me and the co-authors Mike, Larry, & Peter at the NetApp booth. We are all on hand to answer your most technical questions.

vSphere on NetApp Best Practices Released

I am please to share with you that this morning our new Technical Report, TR-3749: vSphere on NetApp Storage Best Practices, has been released. I’d like to thank Mike Slisinger, Larry Touchette, and Peter Learmonth for all of their assistance in the production of this TR.

I’d like to take a few moments to share some of the core enhancements covered in the report.

VMware Co-Brands TR-3428

There's an update to our VI3 storage best practices technical report. There's no technical content updates to be concerned with, instead I would like to share that TR-3428 version 4.5.2 has been officially co-branded by VMware.

This update is basically a quality assurance seal which states that the engineering teams at VMware and NetApp have reviewed and verified the contents of this technical report and the recommendations included within are truly best practices.

This wasn't always the case as some of the content in TR-3428 were truly ground breaking not too long ago. For example the dual VMkernel network designs had on occasion lead to additional discussions and configuration validations prior to implementation.

Kudos to all involved, now I think we've come to a time to let this document rest and focus on the vSphere TR.

What’s the right LUN size for a VMFS datastore?

I can’t tell you how often we are asked this question and the answer has many variables including the amount of aggregated I/O of the servers being virtualized onto the datastore, the storage protocol used in connecting to the datastore, etc.

I/O Efficiency and Alignment – the Cloud Demands Standards

I was surprised to read in the relatively recent EMC report: VMware ESX Server Optimization with EMC® Celerra® Performance Study that when it comes to aligning the partitions inside of virtual machines EMC has diametrically opposed recommendations based on the storage protocol and storage array which one deploys with VMware. I have to say that such recommendations raise a red flag that I believe needs some additional light shed on it.

VI3 on NetApp Best Practices Update

Today we've published a minor update to our VMware on NetApp: Storage Best Practices Technical Report TR-3428. After posting the blog announcing version 4.4 I received a number of comments and emails asking to share and comment as we publish future updates, so without further adieu here's the highlights of version 4.5.1...

vSphere Introduces the Plug-n-Play SAN

With today’s release of vSphere, VMware has introduced numerous new features and technologies all designed to advance the virtual evolution of our data centers. With this release VMware and their storage alliance partners have delivered Plug-n-Play SAN storage connectivity. As you begin downloading the final bits, refreshing your labs and planning your upgrade path to vSphere I’d like to dig into the considerations of and how one can deploy a robust, reliable, and greatly simplified P-n-P SAN architecture with vSphere and NetApp.

A “Multivendor Post” to help our mutual iSCSI customers using VMware

Today’s post is one you don’t often find in the blogosphere, see today’s post is a collaborative effort initiated by Chad Sakac (EMC), which includes contributions from Andy Banta (VMware), Vaughn Stewart (NetApp), Eric Schott (Dell/EqualLogic), and Adam Carter (HP/Lefthand), David Black (EMC) and various other folks at each of the companies. Together, our companies make up the large majority of the iSCSI market, all make great iSCSI targets, and we (as individuals and companies) all want our customers to have iSCSI success.