How to use L2 cache with VMWare?

[rrbnc]

What is the proper way to present the SSD (for L2 cache) to the StarWind VM using VMWare ESXi? Do we just add a VMWare datastore to the SSD and add a virtual disk to the StarWind VM? Or is there a way to pass the SSD through to the VM, either using some passthrough method or RDM?

This also brings up the question: how does StarWind detect an SSD failure when using VMWare instead of Hyper-V (where the drive is native)?

[thefinkster]

I would pass it through myself. My StarWind's are not virtual though; so I don't know the potential performance difference between VMDK on Datastore supplied to the VM or just supplying the raw drive to the VM for native use.

Here's a post on VMWare from v5.1 that suggests the difference is negligible. http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2013/01 ... s-rdm.html

So maybe I'd just do the Datastore with VMDK.

[Anatoly (staff)]

So maybe I'd just do the Datastore with VMDK.

+ to that from me!