Paul,
As Netapp appear to be a big supporter of VMware, it
seems to me that if products like snap drive and snap manager for exchange are
not supported within WM's then perhaps Netapp should address this ? Or is it
being addressed ?
I already know of a number of people who are already
using both SD and SME within VM's with Iscsi, and as far as I'm aware there have
been no problems. Due to that we are currently planning a deplyyment along the
lines of using both SD and SME with Iscsi within VM's.
Thanks
Matt
Hi Timothy,
Having been an ASE certified master mechanic in a past
life, I can advise you that it is indeed possible to have
both of those cars as long as they are kept as separate vehicles. It would real
mess if you chopped those cars in half and then welded them together into one
new car. Think of all those electrical splices and incompatible electronics!
Then, of course, there's that whole warranty and support thing. Who will you go
to when the Acura leather cracks?
> Or am I completely blind and missing
something?
Well, just the fact that neither SnapDrive nor SnapManager
are supported with VMware. The only "virtual server" - if you even want to call
it that - that is supported with these products is the
Exchange virtual server that is created in a Windows ("MSCS")
cluster.
Another interesting question that may be worth
investigating prior to putting this into production is whether or not
Microsoft supports the use of Exchange on VMware. Here are a couple of articles
on that:
It is not clear in your email what the motivation is to go
"virtual" for your Exchange server. If it is for DR purposes,
then there may be another way you can accomplish your goals.
There is a solution documented in NetApp Knowledgebase article #10542 that takes
advantage of the virtual server in Windows clustering. Perhaps this article
will help you accomplish your goals?
Please let us know if you have any more
questions.
Regards,
Paul Benn
SnapManager Development Team
NetApp
So, say for
example, I want to virtualize an Exchange server. Lets also say that
I want to manage it via Snapdrive and SME. Lets also say, just for the
heck of it, that I want both the new front-engined Acura NSX as well as the
Porsche RC3.
The cars aside, I
would have to run iSCSI from within the VM, install and use Snapdrive from
within the VM to provision LUNs, install Exchange and then use SME?
It seems
kind of silly to use iSCSI from within a VM if the ESX box were
fiber attached to the Filer, just to be able to use Snapdrive and SME,
no?
I would love to be
able to use the features of SD and SME within a completely virtual environment
and am wondering what some real world implementations other VMware/Netapp
customers are running. Do you run storage for the databases and logs in VMDK's
and manage snapshots and backups from a VMware virtual machine perspective or
do you manage them as iSCSI LUNs and use SD and SME?
Or am I completely
blind and missing something?
Timothy L. Hollingworth
Sr. Network Engineer, ePlus Technology
Inc.
678.462.6698 (cell)
AIM: HollingworthTim
YIM: t_holling
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