SSD L2 Cache or "pure" SSD LUN

[ltb76]

Hi,

I currently have a small iSCSI SAN for my ESX home LAB.
I have 8 x 4TB WD Black in RAID 10 on a LSI 9265 controller and 3 x 60GB SSD on the MB controller that I use for L2 Cache.
I have a i7, 16GB RAM and 4 Intel NICs in the rig.
Performance is acceptable, not great.

I'm thinking of upgrading.
I will be switching to an Xeon E3, 10GB NIC and 2x IBM M1015 controller flashed to IT mode.
The 8x 4TB disks will be connected to one M1015 controller and collected in Storage Spaces on Server 2012R2
I will add 3x 500GB Samsung 850 PRO disks on the second M1015 controller. Again collected in Storage Spaces.

Now my question, what would give me the best performance.
Using the 3x500GB SSDs for L2 Cache, or as a separate LUN for my hot data (My hot data takes up around 800GB) And then reusing the 3x60GB SSDs for L2Cace for the slow HDD LUN?

[Max (staff)]

Hi,
It's SSD configured as L2 caching + StarWind LSFS (Thin provisioned log structured device)if your environment has less Reads and more Writes.
And it's SSD configured as L2 caching + StarWind FLAD (image file) if you have more Reads and less writes.
You can always save part of the SSD and provision it as a separate LUN for high IO VMs.
Hope this helps.

BTW: What SS type are you planning to use?