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iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Source: microsoft.public.virtualserver
Sent: 03/04/2005
From: "Alamo" <Alamo39@_yoyoyo remoooveee me_gmail.com>
Message:

I'm trying to find out if MS will support iSCSI storage being used in
virtual servers. The plan is to connect to a SATA array for storage and I
wanted to do this via iSCSI.

Thanks

Post Reply | This is Spam! | Mark as Spam

Related Messages

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/18/2005
From: "LarryLi" <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

------=_NextPart_000_0013_01C542DF.D98FFE40
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="big5"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Yes. It supports iSCSI driver if you install your OS in vhd and then =
install the iSCSI driver in your virtual server. Our BizCON Recovery =
SANter is using this approach to provide BCP solution.

Larry Li
Business Development Manager
BizCON Solutions Limited
BizCON Recovery SANter

"Alamo" <Alamo39@_yoyoyo remoooveee me_gmail.com> =A6b=B6l=A5=F3 =
news:(email address - cut out) =A4=A4=BC=B6=BCg...
and I=20
------=_NextPart_000_0013_01C542DF.D98FFE40
Content-Type: text/html;
charset="big5"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=3DContent-Type content=3D'text/html; charset=3Dbig5">
<META content=3D'MSHTML 6.00.2800.1498" name=3DGENERATOR>
<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2>Yes. It supports iSCSI driver if you install your OS =
in vhd=20
and then install the iSCSI driver in your virtual server. Our =
BizCON=20
Recovery SANter is using this approach to provide BCP =
solution.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2>Larry Li</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2>Business Development Manager</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2>BizCON Solutions Limited</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2><SPAN lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #0033cc; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: auto">B</SPAN><SPAN=20
lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #ff9900; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: auto">i</SPAN><SPAN=20
lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #0033cc; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: auto">zCON=20
Recovery </SPAN><SPAN lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: red; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: auto">SAN</SPAN><SPAN=20
lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #0033cc; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: =
auto">ter</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2><SPAN lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #0033cc; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: =
auto"></SPAN></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2><SPAN lang=3DEN-GB=20
style=3D'FONT-WEIGHT: bold; FONT-SIZE: 18pt; COLOR: #0033cc; FONT-STYLE: =
italic; FONT-FAMILY: "Arial Black"; text-shadow: =
auto"></SPAN></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3D2>"Alamo" <</FONT><A =
href=3D'mailto:Alamo39@_yoyoyo"><FONT=20
size=3D2>Alamo39@_yoyoyo</FONT></A><FONT size=3D2> remoooveee =
me_gmail.com> =A6b=B6l=A5=F3=20
</FONT><A href=3D'news:(email address - cut out)"><FONT=20
size=3D2>news:(email address - cut out)</FONT></A><FONT =
size=3D2>=20
=A4=A4=BC=B6=BCg...</FONT></DIV><FONT size=3D2>> I'm trying to find =
out if MS will support=20
iSCSI storage being used in <BR>> virtual servers.  The plan is =
to=20
connect to a SATA array for storage and I <BR>> wanted to do this via =

iSCSI.<BR>> <BR>> Thanks<BR>> <BR>> </FONT></BODY></HTML>

------=_NextPart_000_0013_01C542DF.D98FFE40--

Show quoted text

> I'm trying to find out if MS will support iSCSI storage being used in=20
> virtual servers. The plan is to connect to a SATA array for storage =
> wanted to do this via iSCSI.
>=20
> Thanks
>=20
>

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/21/2005
From: Chris Hills <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

LarryLi wrote:

Larry

But, I would prefer to use an iSCSI target for the OS itself!

Regards

Chris

Show quoted text

> Yes. It supports iSCSI driver if you install your OS in vhd and then
> install the iSCSI driver in your virtual server. Our BizCON Recovery
> SANter is using this approach to provide BCP solution.

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/21/2005
From: Chris Hills <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

Chris Hills wrote:

I should point out that Vmware ESX has this capability.

Show quoted text

> But, I would prefer to use an iSCSI target for the OS itself!

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/21/2005
From: "Steve Radich $BitShop, Inc.$" <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

I believe it was IBM held a pattent on software to do basically this, or
some form of it. I remember because we spent weeks trying to negotiate with
someone (I think IBM) to licenseit from them for things exactly like this
(Virtual Server itself wasn't in the mix, but same concept).

That was about 2 years ago I think - They were unwilling to license it
unless we were a NIC manufacturer willing to talk volumes in the millions of
units. Being a web host we don't quite have millions of computers yet
<grin>.

Doing this in software isn't horribly hard, you take a PXE boot system, you
write a simple dos mode int 13 (I think it's interrupt 13) driver for disk
i/o, which should be what is used until windows switches to kernel mode, and
you somehow manage to get windows to load the iscsi initiator in the right
order, then switch to it.

There's also other solutions like iSCSI that can be used, we have a few
hundred hours of R&D in this subject but concluded, at least at the time, it
was unpractical to implement.

Now that said, it's not a hard concept, but it's a lot of code and
unfortunately we don't have a market to sell that to so didn't invest any
more time in it.

I'm quite surprised someone doesn't have a simple solution to this, unless
IBM's patent is stopping anyone else from doing it.

I'm sure Microsoft could license it, but I doubt many people are asking for
it. You could most likely mount the images on iSCSI targets in the host
and save the .vhd files on the iSCSI targets instead.

Also if you have a hardware assisted iSCSI then you SHOULD get better
performance than you would in the virtual guest.

Steve Radich - http://www.aspdeveloper.net - Virtual Server FAQ
BitShop, Inc. - http://www.bitshop.com - Managed Servers, Colocation,
ASP.Net Development

"Chris Hills" <(email address - cut out)> wrote in message
news:Oag$(email address - cut out)...

Show quoted text

> Chris Hills wrote:
>> But, I would prefer to use an iSCSI target for the OS itself!
>
> I should point out that Vmware ESX has this capability.

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/21/2005
From: (email address - cut out) (Steve Marfisi)
Message:

emBoot has written an network boot solution for iSCSI that is tested
to work under Virtual PC (with ASPI turned off in the VM's BIOS).
Given that most of us have been in the network boot space for 10+
years, I am not sure that we would qualify our efforts as not
"horribly hard" :) - it took some serious time to make this work
right.

Steve Marfisi
emBoot Inc.
www.emboot.com

"Steve Radich $BitShop, Inc.$" <(email address - cut out)> wrote in message news:<(email address - cut out)>...

Show quoted text

> I believe it was IBM held a pattent on software to do basically this, or
> some form of it. I remember because we spent weeks trying to negotiate with
> someone (I think IBM) to licenseit from them for things exactly like this
> (Virtual Server itself wasn't in the mix, but same concept).
>
> That was about 2 years ago I think - They were unwilling to license it
> unless we were a NIC manufacturer willing to talk volumes in the millions of
> units. Being a web host we don't quite have millions of computers yet
> <grin>.
>
> Doing this in software isn't horribly hard, you take a PXE boot system, you
> write a simple dos mode int 13 (I think it's interrupt 13) driver for disk
> i/o, which should be what is used until windows switches to kernel mode, and
> you somehow manage to get windows to load the iscsi initiator in the right
> order, then switch to it.
>
> There's also other solutions like iSCSI that can be used, we have a few
> hundred hours of R&D in this subject but concluded, at least at the time, it
> was unpractical to implement.
>
> Now that said, it's not a hard concept, but it's a lot of code and
> unfortunately we don't have a market to sell that to so didn't invest any
> more time in it.
>
> I'm quite surprised someone doesn't have a simple solution to this, unless
> IBM's patent is stopping anyone else from doing it.
>
> I'm sure Microsoft could license it, but I doubt many people are asking for
> it. You could most likely mount the images on iSCSI targets in the host
> and save the .vhd files on the iSCSI targets instead.
>
> Also if you have a hardware assisted iSCSI then you SHOULD get better
> performance than you would in the virtual guest.
>
> Steve Radich - http://www.aspdeveloper.net - Virtual Server FAQ
> BitShop, Inc. - http://www.bitshop.com - Managed Servers, Colocation,
> ASP.Net Development
>
>
> "Chris Hills" <(email address - cut out)> wrote in message
> news:Oag$(email address - cut out)...
> > Chris Hills wrote:
> >> But, I would prefer to use an iSCSI target for the OS itself!
> >
> > I should point out that Vmware ESX has this capability.

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/22/2005
From: "Ben Armstrong [MSFT]" <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

Hi Alamo,

This works today - and will be officially supported by Microsoft with
the release of SP1 for Virtual Server 2005.
--
Cheers,
Benjamin Armstrong
===============================
Virtual machine Program Manager

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
You assume all risk for your use.

Alamo wrote:

Show quoted text

> I'm trying to find out if MS will support iSCSI storage being used in
> virtual servers. The plan is to connect to a SATA array for storage and I
> wanted to do this via iSCSI.
>
> Thanks
>
>

Re: iSCSI and Virtual Server 2005

Sent: 04/23/2005
From: Chris Hills <(email address - cut out)>
Message:

Ben Armstrong [MSFT] wrote:

Will it be supported as option to use an iSCSI target instead of vhd?

Show quoted text

> This works today - and will be officially supported by Microsoft with
> the release of SP1 for Virtual Server 2005.

Post Reply | This is Spam! | Mark as Spam

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