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More Hyper-V 2012 setup questions

I am ready to move forward with my setup. I will be running the following on a Dell T310 with 32 GB RAM. Small setup with 10 or so users and 1 physical server. Replacing SBS 2008

Based on advice from some very knowledgeable people on here I plan to have :

4-1Tb 4th gen. WD enterprise drives set up in a Raid 1 so that I will have 2 separate 1tb drives.

Using 2012 Hyper-v I assume the OS for this will just be installed on Drive 1

Drive 1 will be 2012 Essentials R2 VM installed as DC
Drive 2 will have Server 2012 VM installed running exchange 2013
Drive 1 will have a VHDx installed for the Exchange database.

My questions are:

1) Should I make a separate partition on Drive 1 for the Hyper-V OS or just install it as is?

2) When I install the 2012/Exchange VM on drive 2 should I create a folder or just put the VM in the root of Drive 2.

3) Which drive would it be best to locate my 'data' drives? I plan on creating a VHDx for just data files and probably the redirected user folders.

4) If I decide to add a third server (Maybe intranet site) which drive would be best to house it?

Thanks,

Steve

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Christopher Reed

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wrfdchief

ASKER

Chris,

Thanks for your response. As far as the hyper-v I will probably just do a full OS install with the hyper-v role. Why? Well basically because I am not a command line guru nor am I a full-time IT guy. It just seems to be easier that way to me, With that being said I have kind of wavered back and forth on this. I even thought about installing the core hyper-v on a USB drive and booting from that. Still on the fence about which way to go and am open to any input.

The reason for separating the drives like I had initially stated was to keep the Database drive for the Exchange server on a different HD spindle. With as few users as I will have it probably won't matter much. I will probably just create a separate drive on the second hard drive for my Data Files (Shares, user folders, folder redirection etc.) Unless there is an issue you can see?

Thanks again for all your input

Steve

Christopher Reed

No sir. I don't see any issues with that. You could do the following with or without making a separate OS partition:

Drive 1: Windows Server with Hyper-V role
All VMs stored on Drive 1

Drive 2: Data VHDXs and/or Data Files (Shares, user folders, folder redirect etc.)

I am in total agreement with you as far as installing the full OS vs. just the Hypervisor. I am more of a visual GUI person as well so it makes it easier to get things done instead of having to type all of the commands. :-)

Cheers,
Chris

wrfdchief

ASKER

So....... while still researching this issue right after I typed in my response to you I found an interesting article about keeping your hyper-v on its own partition. A guy had an update that hosed his hyper-v system. With the hyper-v being on its own partition all he had to do was reinstall and all was good. Hadn't thought about that before.

Christopher Reed

That's good to know. I'm putting this one in my Personal Knowledgebase. :^) For the record, I suggested a separate partition to begin with, I just never heard of anything specific as to why you would do that.

Thanks!