Tag: VVols

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VMware Capacity Reporting Part V: VVols and UNMAP

Storage capacity reporting seems like a pretty straight forward topic. How much storage am I using? But when you introduce the concept of multiple levels of thin provisioning AND data reduction into it, all usage is not equal (does it compress well? does it dedupe well? is it zeroes?).

This multi-part series will break it down in the following sections:

  1. VMFS and thin virtual disks
  2. VMFS and thick virtual disks
  3. Thoughts on VMFS Capacity Reporting
  4. VVols and capacity reporting
  5. VVols and UNMAP

Let’s talk about the ins and outs of these in detail, then of course finish it up with why VVols makes this so much better.

NOTE: Examples in this are given from a FlashArray perspective. So mileage may vary depending on the type of array you have. The VMFS and above layer though are the same for all. This is the benefit of VMFS–it abstracts the physical layer. This is also the downside, as I will describe in these posts.

Continue reading “VMware Capacity Reporting Part V: VVols and UNMAP”

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VMware Capacity Reporting Part IV: VVol Capacity Reporting

Storage capacity reporting seems like a pretty straight forward topic. How much storage am I using? But when you introduce the concept of multiple levels of thin provisioning AND data reduction into it, all usage is not equal (does it compress well? does it dedupe well? is it zeroes?).

This multi-part series will break it down in the following sections:

  1. VMFS and thin virtual disks
  2. VMFS and thick virtual disks
  3. Thoughts on VMFS Capacity Reporting
  4. VVols and capacity reporting
  5. VVols and UNMAP

Let’s talk about the ins and outs of these in detail, then of course finish it up with why VVols makes this so much better.

NOTE: Examples in this are given from a FlashArray perspective. So mileage may vary depending on the type of array you have. The VMFS and above layer though are the same for all. This is the benefit of VMFS–it abstracts the physical layer. This is also the downside, as I will describe in these posts. Continue reading “VMware Capacity Reporting Part IV: VVol Capacity Reporting”

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Announcing Pure Storage FlashArray VVol GA

This is a blog post I have been waiting to write for a long time. We at Pure Storage are pleased to announce that vSphere Virtual Volume support on the FlashArray is officially GA!

The FlashArray now supports running VVols in Purity 5.0.0 and later. The cool thing about the FlashArray is the flexibility of the Purity Operating Environment–so VVols are supported on all FA 400 models (405, 420, and 450), //M models (m10, m20, m50, m70) and FlashArray//X. Continue reading “Announcing Pure Storage FlashArray VVol GA”

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What is a VVol Datastore?

I have been traveling around lately talking about VVols and one of the most commonly misunderstood objects is the VVol datastore. What is it? What does capacity mean on it? Why does it even exist?

These are all good questions. The great thing about VVols is that very little changes in how the VMware user interacts with vSphere. But at the same time, what actual happens is VERY different. So let’s work through this.

Continue reading “What is a VVol Datastore?”

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What is a Config VVol Anyways?

I have blogged a decent amount recently about VVols and in many of those posts I mention config VVols. When using vSphere Virtual Volumes, VMs have one, some, or all of the following VVols types:

  • Data VVols–every virtual disk you add creates a data VVol on your array
  • Swap VVol–when you power on a VVol-based VM, a swap VVol is created. When you power it off, this is deleted.
  • Memory VVol–When you create a snapshot and store the memory state or when you suspend a VM, this is created.
  • Config VVol–represents a folder on a VVol datastore.

This statement about config VVols deserves a bit more attention I think. What does that really mean? Understanding config VVols is important  when it comes to recovery etc. So let’s dig into this.

Continue reading “What is a Config VVol Anyways?”

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VVol Lightboard Videos

Quick post. I did some light board videos together on vSphere Virtual Volumes. Lightboard videos are pretty fun to do, the unfortunate part is that I have horrible hand writing. So I immediately apologize for that.

A common question I get with these videos is how do you write backwards. I don’t. I am nowhere near that skilled, as you can see I can barely write forwards. I write normally which appears backwards and the video team mirrors the video.

This is a three part series, the entire playlist can be found here:

Continue reading “VVol Lightboard Videos”

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Virtual Volumes: VVol Bindings Explained

Virtual Volumes change quite a lot of things. One of these is how your storage volumes are actually connected. This change is necessitated for two reasons:

  • Scale. Traditional ESXi SCSI limits how many SCSI devices can be seen at once. 256 in 6.0 and earlier and 512 in 6.5. This is still not enough when every virtual disk its own volume.
  • Performance. Virtual Volumes are provisioned and de-provisioned and moved and accessed constantly. If every time one of these operations occurred a SC SI rescan was required, we would see rescan storms unlike this world has ever witnessed.

So VMware changed how this is done. Continue reading “Virtual Volumes: VVol Bindings Explained”

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Recovering a Deleted Virtual Machine with VVols

Virtual Volumes provide a great many benefits, some large, some small. Depending on the VM, recovering a deleted VM could be either of those.

With traditional VMFS, once you have selected “delete from disk” restoring that VM could have been a process. Either restoring from backup or hoping you had a snapshot of the VMFS on the array. Either way, you are probably going to incur data loss, as the last backup or snapshot is unlikely to be from the time right before the deletion.

Let me be VERY clear here. Regardless to the rest of this post, I am not saying once you move to VVols you do not need backup! You absolutely still do. VVols just give you a nice way to do an immediate recovery of the latest point-in-time without having to lose anything, assuming your array support it.

“Wait, did you say delete VM “AD” or VM “80”?”

“Um… definitely not AD that’s our active directory…”

Continue reading “Recovering a Deleted Virtual Machine with VVols”
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Queue Depth Limits and VVol Protocol Endpoints

I posted a few months back about ESXi queue depth limits and how it affects performance. Just recently, Pure Storage announced our upcoming support for vSphere Virtual Volumes. So, this begs the question, what changes with VVols when it comes to queuing? In a certain view, a lot. But conceptually, actually very little. Let’s dig into this a bit more. 

Continue reading “Queue Depth Limits and VVol Protocol Endpoints”