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excedeoFlag for Afghanistan

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Datastore Size Question

I have a new Dell server, with 8 600GB disks in it in a RAID-6 array.  All together, they are 3.3TB of online drive space.  

So I loaded it with ESX/i 4, and am trying to create a Datastore to put the VMs on.  When I try to create the datastore, I am using the 8MB block size, but the net size of the datastore is ALWAYS 1.27TB, rather than the true capacity of 3.3TB!  

No matter what size I make the store, it always comes out to 1.27TB (even if I make it smaller, like say 1,024GB), and it will even show me that there are 3.3TB of space, but it still says that 1.27 is free.  

Am I doing something wrong here?  I created screenshots of the datastore configuration process in hopes that someone might be able to help me out here...

Thanks,

Ed
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ryder0707
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Please ensure the LUN size is equal or smaller than 2TB. Max vmfs size per volume is 2TB.
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coolsport00
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Hi,

As far as I know the 2 TB limit is about LUN size... You must never have a LUN larger than 1,99 TB (exactly the limit is 2 TB - 512 MB).

The limit is not about VMFS, meaning that eve if you make small VMFS volume in a big LUN this LUN cannot be bigger than 2 TB - 512 Mb in size (1,99 TB).

Have a good day.
Actually, if you want to get 'technical' ir: terminology (which is ok) :)  ....the 2TB limit is "per Extent" (see the Conf Max Guide I provided above). With the max # of Extents allowed as 32, you can have a total "Volume" (or VMFS) size of 64TB. So, you're not really correct in your assumption "PaciB". You can have a LUN larger than 2TB, but when adding the datastore to the host, ESX will only 'see' 2TB (or slightly less). You can then 'Extend' the VMFS volume (datastore) to a larger size (again, the Extent can't be larger than 2TB though).

Regards,
~coolsport00
I see...

But the disk space above 2 TB in the LUN will never be used by ESX 4.0... You cannot make an new extent in the same LUN if you already have used the first 2 TB of the LUN, can you ?
Your Conf Max Guide says 2 TB per LUN what let us suppose the size above 2 TB can never be used.

By the way... I was also wrong on the limit size. It is 2 TB - 512 B

Yes, you can...if you add the LUN as a datastore because that's how you create Extents. If you're using the LUN as a RDM, then no, you can't have a LUN larger than 2TB.

~coolsport00
BTW, I've been wrong/inaccurate several times; it'll happen again. :-)

~coolsport00
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ASKER

OK, I have solved it, but I'm not sure why.  Apparently, the ESX/i didn't like the size of the RAID container it was living on.  Because it was so large, the VMWare could not see all of it.  I ended up reconfiguring it into two equally sized (1.63TB) volumes, reinstalling ESX/i to the first volume, and voila! it auto-configured two 1.63TB datastores for me, both of which are now accessible for storing data.  Now, I don't know for the life of my why that was, but it is now working.  It would be really nice if it were able to go bigger though, if anyone has a solution that will allow the use of all the disks as one big store that would be great...  Does ESX do bigger stores?

Ed
"excedeo", that was actually 1 of my suggestions from post #31503989 ("you can do 1 of 2 things - 1. create 2 separate datastores from your disks, OR 2. you can create an extent of your current datastore") :)

Again, there is no way to add a datastore larger than 2TB, EXCEPT by adding it, then extending it with the link I provided above (http://blog.wilmsenit.nl/?p=630). That is a limitation of VMware..no workarounds.

Regards,
~coolsport00
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Right you were, coolsport00!  Had I read the whole thing instead of clicking on the link so fast I might have realized it sooner... :-) Thanks everyone!