Virtual San Free questions - current version

nguyendot · Thu Mar 16, 2017 6:01 am

Here is my use case:

I've already got a 1/2nd tier SAN and want to set up some Tier3 block storage with my recently decommissioned servers. I've got stacks of them and want to pick 1 or 2 of them to set up some big storage.

Let's say I have a Dell R720XD and want to load it with huge drives and maybe 2 SSD.

Will the Virtual SAN free allow me to create a standalone SAN with this? I see it's definitely capable of doing two nodes.

Does the free edition have SSD/RAM caching built in? Is it limited on size?

I see external iSCSI is no longer offered - why not? I don't really want to use NFS as the entire environment is iSCSI. I guess this is the use case for the paid version.

Is there a more in depth build/quick start guide for the latest version? All your documentation is several years old for this.

I don't need the fastest, the caching is just cool. I'd really like to just have an iSCSI target to present to my 3 ESXi hosts so I can dump lots of tier3 data on it.

Thanks

Fri Mar 17, 2017 5:58 pm

Hello nguyendot,
Thank you for your interest in StarWind solutions.
I do not see any issues to create a Standalone device in the free version. You can follow the steps in this guide:https://www.starwindsoftware.com/quick- ... irtual-san
It is several years old, but there are no huge differences in GUI, so it could be helpful. I am sorry for this, we are working on the documentation update now.
Since you will have Standalone devices, I would recommend you do not specify L1 cache for them or set it only in Write-Through mode. With these settings, you will not loose data in the cache in case of power outage. Also, there is no limits for L1 cache in free version.
As for the external iSCSI connection, it is allowed for Standalone devices everywhere but has the limit for HA devices. Currently, you can connect target for HA device only on the local server and partner server.
Additionally, since you have a plan to connect iSCSI target on ESXi host, please create a device with 512 bytes sector size just to avoid compatibility issues.
Please let us know if you have any other questions.