OK here are the details of my project.
I aim to create a 2-node cluster with ESXi 5.5 and a number of datastores residing on both HDDs and SSDs. This way I should have some variety in terms of performance.
The ESXi hosts will be virtualized with VMware Workstation 10.
Now my PC wasn't very powerful to begin with so I bumped the specs making a few upgrades including, but not limited to, an extra 8GB of RAM and a PCI-Express-based fast SSD.
INFRASTRUCTURE COMPONENTS
Physical computer (PC):
Intel Core i7 2600K 4C/8T CPU @4.5GHz
Corsair Dominator GT 4x4GB 1866MHz DDR3 RAM
ASUS P8P67 Deluxe motherboard
OCZ Agility 3 60GB SATA SSD
OCZ RevoDrive 3 120GB PCI-E SSD
Hitachi 2TB 7200rpm SATA HDD
1x Intel 82579V Ethernet Gigabit NIC + 1x Realtek RTL8168 Gigabit NIC (I may or may not use them)
External QNAP 16TB NAS with 2x gigabit NICs teamed (I may or may not use it)
HP 1810 8G 8-port managed switch (I may or may not use it)
“Physical” ESX hosts:
ESXi1 (ESXi 5.5)
- 1x vCPU quad-core / 4GB RAM / 1x 40GB + 2x 10GB disks (HDD) + 2x 12.5GB disks (SSD)
192.168.0.101 (2x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
ESXi2 (ESXi 5.5)
- 1x vCPU quad-core / 4GB RAM / 1x 40GB + 2x 10GB disks (HDD) + 2x 12.5GB disks (SSD)
192.168.0.102 (2x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
Centralized management server:
VCENTER01 (vCenter Server 5.5 + vCenter Converter 5.5) (Win Server 2K8 R2)
- 1x vCPU single-core / 4GB RAM / 1x 40GB disk
192.168.0.100 (1x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
Storage:
VSTORAGE01 (vSphere Storage Appliance as a VSA cluster, using the disks of the ESXi hosts) (SUSE Linux Enterprise)
- 2x 10GB (from ESXi1) + 2x 10GB (from ESXi2) + 2x 12.5GB (from ESXi1) + 2x 12.5GB (from ESXi2) disks
192.168.0.103 (1x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
Active Directory server / DNS server:
VCENTER01?
VUM (vSphere Update Manager) server:
VCENTER01 (Win Server 2K8 R2)
- 1 vCPU single-core / 4GB RAM / 1x 40GB disk
192.168.0.100 (1x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
VMs:
100x VMTCLn (0 < n < 101) (TinyCore Linux)
- 1x vCPU single-core / 64MB RAM / 1x 64MB disk
192.168.0.104 - 192.168.0.204 (1x gigabit NIC, configuration TBD)
Possible future mix of platforms:
25x TinyCore Linux 64MB
25x BasicLinux 8MB
25x Windows 95 56MB
25x Windows 98SE 64MB