Chapter 4 - Advanced Configurations

Abstract

This chapter reviews some of the advanced configuration possibilities for both ESX Server and the virtual machines. VMware provides tremendous flexibility with configuration possibilities. The chapter focuses at network bandwidth shaping, disk shaping as well as different memory configuration possibilities. The chapter also examines the ability to set CPU affinity and finally explores clustering options. The chapter concludes with an explanation of how to set up a cluster in a box and a complete walkthrough of setting up a Windows 2003 Cluster Service. ESX Server allows controlling certain aspects of network traffic on virtual machines. ESX Server can control three areas of outgoing network traffic: average bandwidth, peak bandwidth, and burst size. VMware ESX Server allows controlling access to the CPUs on which the Service Console and the virtual machines run. This management is in the form of minimum and maximum percentage values, as well as shares. A minimum percentage value is the minimum amount of time that either the Service Console or the virtual machine is guaranteed on a particular processor. The maximum percentage value is the maximum amount of time that the Service Console of a virtual machine is guaranteed on a particular processor or processors if running on virtual smp.