I am beginner user and I need recommendation for HD installation

[virmix]

Primary > 1 SSD Disk 1Tb (I want to use OS , Proxmox and VM , 1 or 2 snapshot)
Secondary > 1 HD 2Tb (I want to use for Backup , ISO and snapshot)

1 VM : 700Gb
Free Space for future VM expanding : 200Gb

In the installation I want to use the max possible space for VM

Advanced LVM Configuration Options

hdsize : by default
swapsize : 8Gb
maxroot : 10Gb
maxvz : default
minfree : 8Gb


This settings are right ... any suggestion ?

Thanks

 

[Dunuin]

What SSD are you using? Proxmox will write every minute to the SSD and your VMs in case of DBs maybe every second and this as syncronous writes so the cache of consumer SSDs can't be used and it will wear down the SSD in some months. Shouldn't be that bad if you use LVM instead of ZFS but in my case Proxmox with 2 VMs was writing 1 MB/s = 86GB per day while idleing. If using consumer SDDs without powerloss protection this will cause a high write amplification and this 86GB per day could end in 1 TB per day or more.

And as far as I know snapshots will always be saved on the drive you are snapshotting. Only the dump of RAM can be saved on another disk.
You can also mount a network share and write your backups directly to that share. So the backup is more secure on another device and ISOs can be loaded from a network share too. This way there is no need for the HDD except for RAM dumps but you can also snapshot without dumping the RAM but this way the snapshots aren't that secure. But if you dump the RAM you need to stop the VM every time you snapshot so that isn't a option for hourly snapshots.

And I would use some kind of raid so you don't loose any data or need the do the whole setup again if a drive fails. You can use ZFS software raid / hardware raid / onboard raid if you install Proxmox from the ProxmoxVE iso or mdraid software raid if you install debian and the proxmox packages atop of it.

 

[virmix]

What SSD are you using? Proxmox will write every minute to the SSD and your VMs in case of DBs maybe every second and this as syncronous write so the cache of consumer SSDs can't be used and it will wear down the SSD in some months. Shouldn't be that bad if you use LVM instead of ZFS but in my case Proxmox with 2 VMs was writing 1 MB/s = 86GB per day while idleing. If using consumer SDDs without powerloss protection this will cause a high write amplification and this 86GB per day could end in 1 TB per day or more.

I will use a dedicated server in datacenter ( Intel Xeon , 8 core , 16Gb Ram , 1x SSD 1Tb Profesional and 1xSATA 2Tb Enterprise )

 

[Dunuin]

I will use a dedicated server in datacenter ( Intel Xeon , 8 core , 16Gb Ram , 1x SSD 1Tb Profesional and 1xSATA 2Tb Enterprise )

How much snapshots are you planning to keep? Keep in mind that they also need space. If you want to keep snapshots for 3 months all data you change or delete will still be on that same drive and only be deleted after that 3 months. If you also want to dump the RAM this will need up to 16GB per snapshot so that can take some space too. In worst case 1.44TB if you snapshot every day for 3 months.

If you really need 700GB for that one VM and want to be safe in case of problems or drive failures i would choose 2x 2TB SSDs and mirror them. As said before, as far as i know you can't save your snapshots to the HDD. And backups shouldn't be kept on the same host and netinst isos are really small and you only need them once for installation so there is not really a big use for that HDD. Except for maybe RAM dumps.

But if you want to use raid for mirroing the SSDs keep in mind that the ProxmoxVE Iso only support software raid via ZFS and ZFS needs lots of RAM. If you only got 16GB you might not have enough left for that VM because ZFS will use 8GB alone on default config.
If it is a dedicated server you could look if the BIOS/UEFI supports some raid. If that is not the case you could just install your debian installation with LVM on top of a mdraid software raid and install proxmox to that debian install.

 

[virmix]

How much snapshots are you planning to keep? Keep in mind that they also need space. If you want to keep snapshots for 3 months all data you change or delete will still be on that same drive and only be deleted after that 3 months. If you also want to dump the RAM this will need up to 16GB per snapshot so that can take some space too.

If you really need 700GB for that one VM and want to be safe in case of problems or drive failures i would choose 2x 2TB SSDs and mirror them. As said before, as far as i know you can't save your snapshots to the HDD. And backups shouldn't be kept on the same host and netinst isos are really small and you only need them once for installation so there is not really a big use for that HDD. Except for maybe RAM dumps.

Only 1 or 2 snapshot without RAM, because I want to full backup to secondary disk and no change in Proxmox or VM from original setup, that is the reason of 1 or 2 snapshot. If i want more snapshot I erase old before. My option is no mirror for hight cost, but if somtehing go wrong I will restore the full backup from secondary driver to primary drive.

This is the reason of all, I need a good settings before start.

Thanks

 

[Dunuin]

Only 1 or 2 snapshot without RAM, because I want to full backup to secondary disk and no change in Proxmox or VM from original setup, that is the reason of 1 or 2 snapshot. If i want more snapshot I erase old before. My option is no mirror for hight cost, but if somtehing go wrong I will restore the full backup from secondary driver to primary drive.

This is the reason of all, I need a good settings before start.

Thanks

But keep in mind that it is not the amount but the age of the snapshot thats needs space. Only 1 manually created snapshot but this one months old will need much more space than dozends of automated daily snapshots. So don't forget to delete that old snapshot after some weeks.
And it is never a good idea to only keep the backups on the same host. Even a server in a datacenter isn't safe from failing power supplies killing the whole server and all drives in it. Atleast download them monthly or so to be safe.

 

[lixaotec]

Dear @Dunuin , would you please also suggest on my setup?

https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/proxmox-setup-for-ssd-consumer-best-practices.77390/#post-345312

thanks