We just ordered 5TB of SATA in a MD3000i. And I plan on attaching it to a ESXi server.
Anyone have any stories (good or bad) about this unit?
Anyone have any stories (good or bad) about this unit?
Experiences with a Dell MD3000i
- Thread starter sryan2k1
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We're probably about to order one - you know they've just started shipping nearline SAS for a very small premium over SATA don't you?
We implemented a few MD3000i/ESXi setups in the last quarter of 2008. The typical setup was:
PowerEdge 2950 with 0 hard drives, 32GB RAM, Dual Quad core. We purchased a 2GB flash drive and following some of the documentation online, created a boot from flash configuration for ESXi.
Dell PowerConnect 5424 switch configured for Jumbo frames, connecting via CAT6 cables to the server via a QLE4062C-CK card. We went with the QLogic over an few Intel cards for better performance, seeing the cards can offload the processing from the system.
MD3000i with 6x 450GB 15k SAS drives in a RAID10 configuration, plus another 6x 146GB 15k SAS drives in another RAID10 configuration. One container will be for boot/apps, while the other is for storage.
Right now, we're running 10VMs and barely scratching the surface of the 2950. The only thing we're noticing is some heavy network utilization, since 80% of the infrastrure is on this one machine. We've purchased a second dual port gigabit card to help offload some of the stress of the teamed, onboard gigabit adapters.
PowerEdge 2950 with 0 hard drives, 32GB RAM, Dual Quad core. We purchased a 2GB flash drive and following some of the documentation online, created a boot from flash configuration for ESXi.
Dell PowerConnect 5424 switch configured for Jumbo frames, connecting via CAT6 cables to the server via a QLE4062C-CK card. We went with the QLogic over an few Intel cards for better performance, seeing the cards can offload the processing from the system.
MD3000i with 6x 450GB 15k SAS drives in a RAID10 configuration, plus another 6x 146GB 15k SAS drives in another RAID10 configuration. One container will be for boot/apps, while the other is for storage.
Right now, we're running 10VMs and barely scratching the surface of the 2950. The only thing we're noticing is some heavy network utilization, since 80% of the infrastrure is on this one machine. We've purchased a second dual port gigabit card to help offload some of the stress of the teamed, onboard gigabit adapters.
We just setup two 2950's and a MD3000i. MD3000i has 10 15K rpm, 300 GB SAS drives. We only have 2 machines virtualized so far but so far performance has been good. I really haven't stressed either server yet though. In the next few weeks I will be transferring our shared folders to one of the virtual hosts in a new content management system so I will have a better idea then.
It is nice to not have to worry about loading all the specific drivers and management software on each server. Windows 2003 Server R2 boots so fast that at first I thought something must be wrong.
The only other thing to keep in mind is you will need either a layer 3 switch or a separate switch for the iSCSI connections. Between the management NICs and iSCSI NICs I used 10 ports on my Cisco 3750 switch. The iSCSI is on its on VLAN to keep it separated from other traffic.
When Dell sells a SAN they include a remote session with a tech who goes through making sure firmwares are up to date, NICs are programmed correctly and that management software is setup. Then he will walk you through the initial setup to get you familiar with LUNS, RAID, and partitions and how they work.
The part that was unexpected is that after we setup the MD3000i the tech then proceeded to show me how to connect to it with VMWare. It was cool because I had a basic understanding of the concepts but the light bulb went on over my head when he showed me and he showed me a couple of caveats to watch out for on the VMWare side.
Of course the next day I undid everything because realized I wanted to carve the LUNS differently once I understood. But I was able to get everything set back up with no problems.
The only thing I haven't figured out yet is how to backup the VMWare files. For the moment I am using Backup Exec agents to get things at the file level.
It is nice to not have to worry about loading all the specific drivers and management software on each server. Windows 2003 Server R2 boots so fast that at first I thought something must be wrong.
The only other thing to keep in mind is you will need either a layer 3 switch or a separate switch for the iSCSI connections. Between the management NICs and iSCSI NICs I used 10 ports on my Cisco 3750 switch. The iSCSI is on its on VLAN to keep it separated from other traffic.
When Dell sells a SAN they include a remote session with a tech who goes through making sure firmwares are up to date, NICs are programmed correctly and that management software is setup. Then he will walk you through the initial setup to get you familiar with LUNS, RAID, and partitions and how they work.
The part that was unexpected is that after we setup the MD3000i the tech then proceeded to show me how to connect to it with VMWare. It was cool because I had a basic understanding of the concepts but the light bulb went on over my head when he showed me and he showed me a couple of caveats to watch out for on the VMWare side.
Of course the next day I undid everything because realized I wanted to carve the LUNS differently once I understood. But I was able to get everything set back up with no problems.
The only thing I haven't figured out yet is how to backup the VMWare files. For the moment I am using Backup Exec agents to get things at the file level.
Hmm? The last two quotes I got from my storage guy was about $11k for 3TB of SAS, and $9k for 5TB of SATA.
Good to hear no real problems with that, I have a 5424 coming in next week to build out my core to all the servers (plus the iSCSI stuff)
Option 1 with the 10x300 gig drives 15k sas $11342.63
Option 2 with the 10x450 gig drives 15k Sas $11920.16
Both with 4 hour onsite, 2 controllers snapshot and Volume Copy.
Shipping not included...
Sorry dont have a price quote for the sata handy. If anyone is interested i would be happy to quote it for you.
Make sure you're asking about the new nearline 7200rpm SAS not SATA.
They have the bulk of SATA but (I presume) have the robustness/control interface of SAS.
They have the bulk of SATA but (I presume) have the robustness/control interface of SAS.
Full R2 via Open Licensing.
Thanks. Just haven't had time to delve into this yet.
If you only have two servers connected to your MD3000i, why don't you bypass the switch and connect your servers directly to the MD3000i?
Eventually I plan to convert my existing Exchange server to a VM and then convert that hardware server into a third virtual server.
You can connect up to four servers directly to the MD3000i. This would mean that you wouldn't get path redundancy but it sounds like you're using a single switch anyway.
You will also not be able to access all your LUNs from all your servers.
Know that using different hardware in the same VM cluster can cause trouble. Specifically, VMotion might fail and crash the guest (same for moving a paused VM from one host to another).
Yes I am using a single switch. I have been calling this my "poor man's SAN" all along. If I had more money to invest then I probably would have gone with a NetApp or Equilogic device to gain more features such as Dedupe along with a separate switch for the extra redundancy.
During my needs assessment I determined I can achieve all my goals with the MD3000i. It was such a steal compared to the other brands that if the time comes that I outgrow it then we will have gotten its value and it will move to a different function such as backup.
My Exchange server that I am planning on converting is the same as my VM server hardware (Dell 2950). Only difference is the processor is older.
During my needs assessment I determined I can achieve all my goals with the MD3000i. It was such a steal compared to the other brands that if the time comes that I outgrow it then we will have gotten its value and it will move to a different function such as backup.
My Exchange server that I am planning on converting is the same as my VM server hardware (Dell 2950). Only difference is the processor is older.
I am in the process of replacing the MD3000i units at work with a pair of Equallogic PS5000e units filed with 1TB drives.
The reason? Primarily the need for array to array replication (the arrays will be at separate locations and the MD3000i only does virtual disk copy within the array) and additional storage.
I'm not saying that my experience with the MD3000i has been bad, performance is okay with fifteen 146GB 15K drives (one hot spare, two seven-disk RAID5 disk groups). The MD3000i arrays have been used for SQL storage, but not for our standalone ESX servers.
The only real gripe that I have is the Storage Manager Client is pretty simple (I came from a NetApp shop BTW), but then again, for the targeted audience, it works.
The reason? Primarily the need for array to array replication (the arrays will be at separate locations and the MD3000i only does virtual disk copy within the array) and additional storage.
I'm not saying that my experience with the MD3000i has been bad, performance is okay with fifteen 146GB 15K drives (one hot spare, two seven-disk RAID5 disk groups). The MD3000i arrays have been used for SQL storage, but not for our standalone ESX servers.
The only real gripe that I have is the Storage Manager Client is pretty simple (I came from a NetApp shop BTW), but then again, for the targeted audience, it works.
Just went through the process, last week, of a Dell rep doing a remote configuration after I set up all the hardware, and walking myself and a couple others through the process. It was not overly torturous.
15x 146Gb 15k RPM SAS (with 2 hot spares), set up in a variety of RAID configs to attach to specific servers. The 146Gb SAS is the big price break point for Dell, at least.
I've seen one with 5x 1Tb drives with the other 10 drives planned in the future. Don't remember the drive speed on that one though.
15x 146Gb 15k RPM SAS (with 2 hot spares), set up in a variety of RAID configs to attach to specific servers. The 146Gb SAS is the big price break point for Dell, at least.
I've seen one with 5x 1Tb drives with the other 10 drives planned in the future. Don't remember the drive speed on that one though.
Oh nice -- 
-- I didn't catch that. Time to update, I think... As soon as I've verified my backups
-- I didn't catch that. Time to update, I think... As soon as I've verified my backups Looking to get an MD3000i to hook up to a few machines (3 Xen Servers, Windows fileserver, Linux DB server). Just spent about half an hour on the phone to a Dell rep, and he said one thing to be careful of was the connected hosts limit - 16 physical plus another 16 virtual.
The "plus 16 virtual" thing has me a bit interested. If I have a LUN attached to my 3 Xen servers, and they're just carving out LVs for Xen VMs, how on Earth is the MD3000i going to know if there's 3 VMs, or 30, running on the Xen servers ?
(In truth I feel a bit silly even asking this question, but I thought I would on the off chance someone has bumped into a problem with it.)
The "plus 16 virtual" thing has me a bit interested. If I have a LUN attached to my 3 Xen servers, and they're just carving out LVs for Xen VMs, how on Earth is the MD3000i going to know if there's 3 VMs, or 30, running on the Xen servers ?
(In truth I feel a bit silly even asking this question, but I thought I would on the off chance someone has bumped into a problem with it.)
The way it was explained to me (bought a MD 3000i for Exchange and VMWare about 9 months ago) is that VM's only count as one of the 16 clients if they attach to a LUN. So having a LUN attached to a VMware box counts as 1. On that LUN you can run 50 virtual machines and they won't count as a client on the SAN. Now if one of those VMs would happen to be Exchange and it mounts a separate LUN from the SAN for DB storage then it would count as a client on the SAN. But for the purposes of virtual machines booting/running off of the SAN it doesn't know about them or care.
Technically the number that is tracked is the number of storage partitions (as seen via the MDS Manager). In a mess of terminology (least to me), this equals the number of host groups (group of hosts that can access a number of LUNs) configured.
So going back to VMware or Xen, you can have 3 LUNs accessed by 3 physical hosts (accessing a clustered file system eg VMFS), with 30 VMs and all of that will count as one host group.
It all depends on how you carve things up.
Their (Dell's) assumption is that non-clustered files systems would be used on by the hosts in which case 16 hosts would be the limit and make sense.
So going back to VMware or Xen, you can have 3 LUNs accessed by 3 physical hosts (accessing a clustered file system eg VMFS), with 30 VMs and all of that will count as one host group.
It all depends on how you carve things up.
Their (Dell's) assumption is that non-clustered files systems would be used on by the hosts in which case 16 hosts would be the limit and make sense.
Originally posted by Fulgan:
Oh nice --
Call Dell for the firmware upgrade. I tried to do it myself and fought with it for 2 hours .. then I called Dell and it took 20 minutes.
Originally posted by Searchy:
Originally posted by Fulgan:
Oh nice --
Call Dell for the firmware upgrade. I tried to do it myself and fought with it for 2 hours .. then I called Dell and it took 20 minutes.
Huh? You just run the cross generation updater app, put in the IPs of both controllers, hit go, wait 15min to an hour, it reboots, and done. Usually anyway. I don't know what dell would do differently.
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