recommended way to install Proxmox VE 2?

[falko]

Hi, new to Proxmox VE and just trying to work out how the install works as i only seem to be able to have the install and storage all in on one instance.

I have a server with 10 disks and i would like the main install to sit on disk 1+2 (raid 1) and use disks 1-8 (raid 10) as the local storage. is that possible or is it best to install proxmox across all 10 disks?

or can you install proxmox on an external USB and then use all disks (raid 10) as the storage

so far Proxmox VE 2 looks great, the turnkey integration is a really neat feature

thanks

 

[tom]

yes, you can install on the raid1 and configure the rest later.

 

[dietmar]

You can also use all 10 disk as RAID 10. IMHO that is easier to manage.

 

[ybcnyc]

not to steal a thread, by i just deployed proxmox 2.0 rc1 on 6disk raid 10 and would like to know what would be the safest/least offline time to expand raid10 to 8 disks. my lsi 8888elp doesn't support online expansion of raid10.

also as OP says it is better to separate proxmox OS with the rest of containers / VMs ? perhaps 2 disks in raid1 for OS and storage on rest in raid 10? also i've read somewhere on the forum it's a good idea not to run two separate raid volumens on the same controller because it decreases the performance? best to separate vols (diff controllers?)

 

[falko]

yes, you can install on the raid1 and configure the rest later.

okay thanks, i have this configured

 

[falko]

You can also use all 10 disk as RAID 10. IMHO that is easier to manage.

how would i do this, where will the main install of Proxmox VE sit?

 

[dietmar]

how would i do this, where will the main install of Proxmox VE sit?

I do not really understand that question. Simply configure the RAID 10, then install PVE.

 

[falko]

I do not really understand that question. Simply configure the RAID 10, then install PVE.

okay I see what you mean, just install proxmox across all disks (raid 10)

the reason i was asking to split it up was i thought there was a performance increase keeping the 'install' and storage separate


thanks

 

[dietmar]

the reason i was asking to split it up was i thought there was a performance increase keeping the 'install' and storage separate

There is not much IO on the root partition (more or less only logging), so I doubt there is any performance impact.

 

[falko]

There is not much IO on the root partition (more or less only logging), so I doubt there is any performance impact.

thanks for the advice, appreciated

 

[mmenaz]

Isn't better have the rest as dedicated LVM storage, so each kvm VM can have it's LVM volume? And when you do snapshot backup, only that single volume currently backed up is snapshotted, instead of all the local storage volume? Also is dedicated lvm volume I/O faster than .raw file inside local volume?
I would love that at installation time proxmox could be limited to use only a certain amount of space for local storage, so you could configure all disks as raid10, install proxmox and left space unused that can be added as lvm storage after installation completion. Is it really that hard to implement or not that important? Maybe I'm missing something.
Best regards

 

[e100]

OpenVZ Containers can not use LVM so how you split up the storage depends on your planned usage.
It is possible to shrink /var/lib/vz to free up space for LVM.
http://www.howtoforge.com/linux_resizing_ext3_partitions

You could also install using Debian squeeze, then upgrade ot Proxmox.
That method would allow you to setup the storage to your liking instead of however Proxmox thinks it should be.

When using RAID cards I typically setup a "boot" array that I install Proxmox onto.
Then I create an array for LVM and add that to Proxmox.

In my experience LVM IO is faster than raw file on ext3.
With Proxmox default installation in both cases you have LVM overhead, but raw file on ext3 you also add ext3 overhead.

 

[Richard Leishman]

To give you an Idea, I have setup two identical hp dl360 g5 nodes with 2x10k 72gb sas in raid 1 and 4x500gb sata 7.2k in raid 10 and DRBD, then I have a 25bay dl180 as the quarum and for any not so important vm's/storage...

 

[falko]

I think it would be good for newcomers (like myself) to have info about different/recommended server configs and set ups in this thread on the wiki maybe ?