Forum Discussion

laroberts's avatar
laroberts
Novice I
9 months ago
Solved

SQL within VMware

If we are setting up SQL within vmware using NVME vvols and NVME controllers on the VM, is there a reason to have your data/log/tempdb volumes on separate virtual NVME storage controllers (for reference: https://www.nocentino.com/posts/2021-09-27-sqlserver-vms-best-practices/#vm-configuration)? Or do those benefits not really translate over when doing NVME storage protocols?

VMWARE
  • laroberts's avatar
    laroberts
    8 months ago
    So, small update: I realized that my NVME vvol was not NVME at all. I'm on Purity v6.5.8 but NVME vvols aren't supported until v6.6.2 (I was confused because the storage endpoint is upgraded to VASA 5 but I guess it still doesnt support the NVME vvol logic until I get onto purity v6.6.2 and it auto added the NVME vvol I created to SCSI instead without me realizing). https://support.purestorage.com/bundle/m_release_notes_for_vmware_solutions/page/Solutions/VMware_Platform_Guide/Release_Notes_for_VMware_Solutions/topics/reference/r_flasharray_vasa_provider_version_by_purity_release.html|https://support.purestorage.com/bundle/m_release_notes_for_vmware_solutions/page/Solutio[…]r_flasharray_vasa_provider_version_by_purity_release.html But I still have the interesting performance difference of using PVSCSI controllers vs the vmware NVME controller (even though they are going over the same SCSI-FC vvol)
  • cmautner's avatar
    cmautner
    Puritan
    9 months ago
    Not to put you on the spot just seeing if you knew the answer offhand
  • anocentino's avatar
    anocentino
    Novice I
    9 months ago
    At this point, since windows doesn't speak NMVe in the guest there's no benefit to using NVMe controllers in your VMs configuration. Using NVMe from the hypervisor down will benefit IO from the host into the array.
  • laroberts's avatar
    laroberts
    Novice I
    9 months ago
    hmm I actually did some testing, and I was getting ~410k IOPS on a vmware windows 2022 VM connected with NVME controllers + NVME vvols
  • laroberts's avatar
    laroberts
    Novice I
    9 months ago
    vs only around 150k IOPS on standard PVSCSI and normal SCSI-FC vVols
  • anocentino's avatar
    anocentino
    Novice I
    9 months ago
    That's a very positive result. My guess is you're getting the benefit of parallelization from the hypervisor down. I'd have to yield to my VMware team for more details on that. Can you describe your load test please?
  • laroberts's avatar
    laroberts
    Novice I
    9 months ago
    For sure, here's the high level (copy from another thread): Wow, so initial findings for SCSI-FC vs NVME-FC are an almost 3x increase in storage performance and huge improvement of latency at the top end (from the OS perspective) Using a vmware VM with 16vcpu/128GB RAM with test cmd: `diskspd.exe -b8K -d300 -o32 -t14 -r -w30 -c200G -Sh -L T:\testfile.dat` SCSI-FC total I/O -> ~157k NVME-FC total I/O -> ~410k "green" lines are NVME-FC and "red/orange" are SCSI-FC