VMware vSphere Storage Appliance

VMware vSphere Storage Appliance is the new software solution which will open rich opportunities of the VMware vSphere platform for ensuring business continuity and automated management of resources for representatives of small and medium business. It will become possible without the special costs and difficulties connected with use of joint storages. VMware vSphere Storage Appliance transforms internal server storage systems to the distributed pool of storages, allowing SMB-clients to take advantages of unsurpassed business continuity and such opportunities of the vSphere platform as High Availability, vMotion, and Distributed Resource Scheduler.

Characteristics and advantages of VMware vSphere Storage Appliance

VMware vSphere Storage Appliance offers a simple, economic alternative to shared storages which will allow SMB to use effectively full-scale opportunities of the VMware vSphere platform, including High Availability, vMotion and Distributed Resource Scheduler. The software solution VMware vSphere Storage Appliance provides:

• Simplicity of installation – only several cliques of a mouse: the solution VMware vSphere Storage Appliance is simple in installation and can be integrated with VMware vCenter Server™. Using the usual single console, users will be able easily to manage memory and servers.
• Possibilities of VMware vSphere High Availability without the need for the additional hardware for joint storages - VMware vSphere Storage Appliance will work as the virtual device based on VMware vSphere. It will integrate internal resources of storage of servers in the virtual pool of the protected storages which is not requiring external physical resources. Working at the same time on several servers, the solution VMware vSphere Storage Appliance will provide data availability for any business challenges even in case of failure on one of servers in group.
• Automation of DPC for small environments - VMware vSphere Storage Appliance will allow representatives of small and medium business to work with performance and efficiency of such level which was available only to large corporate data centers until recently. Possibilities of consolidation of resources will allow clients to maximize use of the hardware and at the same time will open the potential of intellectual automation (by the principle "configured and forgot") the vSphere platform and its such components as vMotion and Distributed Resource Scheduler that guarantees the high level of service of applications.

2013: Updating of VMware vSphere Storage Appliance

The VMware company updated the solution what the press service of the company announced on August 28, 2013.

• Improvements of Virtual Machine File System (VMFS) - to 62 TB for one VMDK.

Now VMware vSphere 5.5 supports vmdk-disks more than 2 TB. Now the volume of a virtual disk of the machine can be up to 62 TB in size. Several big files can be stored in one vmdk now. It is supported only for VMFS 5. The same size there can be also RDM disks.

• Updates of support of MSCS

In VMware vSphere 5.5 following features of clusters from Microsoft are supported:

• ОС MicrosoftWindows 2012
• Policy of ways of Round-robin
• Protocol iSCSI
• Fibre Channel protocol over Ethernet(FCoE)

• Support 16GB E2E

Only now the HBA FC adapters working at speed of 16 Gbps are fully supported.

• PDL AutoRemove

Improvements of compatibility of vSphere Replication

There was a Storage DRS Interoperability function - a possibility of replicable machines to be balanced on storages with means of Storage vMotion technology without replication interruption.

Improvements of the vSphere Replication mechanism

Opportunities for replication of virtual machines are available:

• Possibility of replication of virtual machines between clusters for machines not with the general storages (non-shared storage).
• Support of several points for recovery of the target replicable machine. It protects services from logical damages of data, changes in which are replicated on the reserve platform.
• Simplified Management is the improved integration with vSphere Web Client that allows to monitor process of replication in different representations of vCenter.
• Support of VSAN technology - now machines in such storages are supported by means of replication.
• vCenter Orchestrator - this automation equipment is significantly optimized now in respect of scalability and high availability. Developers can use the simplified functions of diagnostics in vCenter Orchestrator client now.
• VAAI UNMAP/Reclaim command

Now it is possible to return to an array the space released VMFS on volume in the form of blocks a command: esxcli storage vmfs unmap

• VMFS Heap Improvements - can connect up to 64 TB storages to one host of VMware vSphere.

• VMware Virtual Flash (vFlash) - allows to integrate SSD resources a host servers of VMware of ESXi in the uniform pool used for problems of caching to increase high-speed performance of virtual machines. vFlash is the framework allowing third-party vendors of SSD drives and a cache devices to use own algorithms for creation of modules of processing of caches of virtual machines (plug-ins of vFlash Cache Modules). Also own basic algorithm of VMware for work with a cache is implemented. This technology replaces with itself the Swap to SSD function which was in earlier versions of the platform,