New to proxmox - NFS and licensing questions

[Xandrios]

Hi all,

With recent VMWare changes we are looking if Proxmox may be a suitable replacement for our deployments. Having browsed the product pages, and support forums here, a few questions remain. Hoping that the experienced crew can chime in

We like to leave redundancy to the storage level; i.e. using MPIO/multipathing and relatively basic network infrastructure, instead of depending on LACP/MLAG. While there seems to be iSCSI multipath support (albeit possibly only configurable through the CLI?), does the same apply to NFS? This requires NFS 4.1 specifically. Would this be available through the web interface for ease of management?

Reason for preferring NFS is the ability to make thin snapshots. From what I understand without VMWare VAAI/plugin and vmfs options iSCSI only allows fat snapshots, while NFS could theoretically support thin ones - which is important when wanting to use rolling snapshot backups.

Our deployment model includes a large number of remote standalone sites which are not internet connected. If I understand correctly not applying a VE license does still allow for updates, though not from the 'stable enterprise repository' (?). And this will not allow the use of the "offline mirror" feature.

Assuming that we do want to use the offline mirror feature, what would be required to prepare updates for multiple remote clusters? A key for the remote-mirror application itself (I believe I read that this is included with a basic VE subscription), but then also at least a standard VE license for the remote hosts - community or basic is not sufficient when the site is offline?

Your help is much appreciated!

Thanks!

 

[cheiss]

Hi

While there seems to be iSCSI multipath support (albeit possibly only configurable through the CLI?

That's correct - iSCSI multipath is currently only configurable through the CLI.
But you can find multiple threads on that topic here and in general: Proxmox VE is Debian under the hood, i.e. any Debian guide normally also applies to Proxmox VE.

does the same apply to NFS? This requires NFS 4.1 specifically. Would this be available through the web interface for ease of management?

NFS servers/storage can be easily configured via the Web UI, as well as network bonds for e.g. LACP.

Reason for preferring NFS is the ability to make thin snapshots. From what I understand without VMWare VAAI/plugin and vmfs options iSCSI only allows fat snapshots, while NFS could theoretically support thin ones - which is important when wanting to use rolling snapshot backups.

First of, I'd suggest you have a look at the Storage page in our wiki, where all the possible storage types are explained a bit and a overview of their capabilities are given.
Snapshots on NFS are possible in principle, when using the qcow2 underlying file format.

Our deployment model includes a large number of remote standalone sites which are not internet connected. If I understand correctly not applying a VE license does still allow for updates, though not from the 'stable enterprise repository' (?). And this will not allow the use of the "offline mirror" feature.

Regarding your first point; for offline sites we spefically created the Proxmox Offline Mirror tool.
Second, Proxmox VE is fully usable (with all it's features) without buying a subscription. We do not have licenses for Proxmox VE - all code is open source and freely available for use. The subscriptions give you access to the enterprise repositories, which contain better-tested packages and access to our support portal. See also https://proxmox.com/en/services/support.
With POM, you can also mirror the no-subscription repository.

Assuming that we do want to use the offline mirror feature, what would be required to prepare updates for multiple remote clusters? A key for the remote-mirror application itself (I believe I read that this is included with a basic VE subscription), but then also at least a standard VE license for the remote hosts - community or basic is not sufficient when the site is offline?

In general, any subscription is fine. But note that all nodes in a cluster must always be at the same subscription level for you to receive support through our portal.

Assuming that we do want to use the offline mirror feature, what would be required to prepare updates for multiple remote clusters? A key for the remote-mirror application itself (I believe I read that this is included with a basic VE subscription), but then also at least a standard VE license for the remote hosts - community or basic is not sufficient when the site is offline?

The tool itself is pretty simple to set up & use, you just need some storage, e.g. a USB flash drive/hard disk.
Regarding licensing, if you have a Standard or Premium subscription for all (or the majority) of your nodes, you may also be eligible for a free POM key. You can also read up on this a bit more on this in the POM documentation: https://pom.proxmox.com/offline-keys.html

I'm not fully sure about this one (since I seldomly deal with POM), but feel free to contact our sales team (sales@proxmox.com), which are happy to answer any questions about subscriptions!

Hopefully this answers all your questions, but feel free to ask (or contact our sales team for anything regarding subscriptions!)

 

[Xandrios]

Much appreciated @cheiss! I'll be in touch with sales for the subscription questions.

NFS servers/storage can be easily configured via the Web UI, as well as network bonds for e.g. LACP.

Thanks. I did find another topic that shows the NFS 4.1 versions to be available; however it is not entirely clear if that works out of the box (Assuming the server 'offers' multiple paths). The good point is that there seems to be an option to, theoretically, get it working.