![\"vsan\"](\"http:\/\/www.bussink.ch\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2015\/04\/vsan.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nEven running a few large virtual machines on the VSAN Datastore like VDP 6.0 with a 4TB backed disk, I found myself with a lot of spare storage. I’ve invested in the SAS disks (Seagate Enterprise Capacity<\/a> 4TB SAS 7200rpm) backing the VSAN datastore, so the budget is gone for replacing the aging Synology DS1010+.<\/p>\n I’ve recently studied various reviews on the Synology DS2015xs<\/a>, but found the CPU a bit lacking to drive the dual 10GbE SFP+ links, and the Synology DS3615xs<\/a> is a bit expensive. So why not leverage the 10GbE NICs in my management cluster for ultra fast connections, the fast CPUs on my hosts are a nice addition too. The biggest advantage is \u201ccheap\u201d 10GbE file server connections.<\/p>\n The rest of the blog is going in a grey zone… it’s #unsupported<\/strong><\/p>\n Let me show you the goods first.<\/p>\n virtual Synology DS3615xs running on VSAN datastore<\/p><\/div>\n The concept is to create a storage appliance, that leverages the VSAN datastore and its accelerations of read\/writes, and provides a flexible structure, where you could increase the storage on an as needed basis, or create a temporary storage while migrating from one Synology to a newer one. All this running on a vSphere host. A concept that a lot of other companies are doing with their Virtual Storage Appliances.<\/p>\n I’m going to use the XPEnology<\/strong> operating system, which is based on the Synology DiskStation Manager (DSM)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n To build the virtual synology you will need to retrieve the latest copy of the XPEnology<\/strong><\/a> DS3615xs files. You are looking for\u00a0XPEnoboot_DS3615xs_5.1-5022.3.vmdk or a more recent version. Each version can have its own deployment process. The process I have described below is using the\u00a0XPEnoboot_DS3615xs_5.1-5022.3.vmdk version.<\/p>\n There is also a huge forum with lots of contributions and interesting links at the XPEnology forums<\/a>.<\/p>\n 1) Creating the vSynology<\/strong><\/p>\n Now I’m going to say upfront, that you will need to upload the\u00a0XPEnoboot_DS3615xs_5.1-5022.3.vmdk twice<\/strong><\/span> in the virtual storage appliance. Once for the initial install, which will format all disks of the appliance (including the boot vmdk), then again to boot the appliance.<\/p>\n We start by creating a new Virtual Machine.<\/p>\n We give it a name and place it in a Cluster.<\/p>\n And we store the virtual machine and its configuration files on an existing datastore. I have select my vsanDatastore.<\/p>\n We define the hardware compatibility of the\u00a0virtual machine\u00a0and\u00a0select the Guess OS. We are going to use the Linux Other 3.x Linux (64-bit)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n I have added a second\u00a0VMXNET3 network interface, which I put on a dedicated 10GbE Distributed Port Group. So eth0 goes out using uplink1 and eth1 goes out using uplink2. You see these changes in the summary of the appliance below.<\/p>\n We can now go back into the appliance and edit it. We remove the boot disk, and erase it from the disk. (Yeah missing screenshot of this step).<\/p>\n We then use the datastore browser to upload for the first time the XPEnoboot_DS3615xs_5-1-5022.3.vmdk in the appliance folder.<\/p>\n And we add this existing virtual disk to the appliance<\/p>\n The new boot disk is attached as an IDE disk on port IDE(0:0)<\/p>\n In the following screenshot, I’m adding the main disk to the storage appliance. I’m creating a 8TB (or 8192GB) virtual disk, and select my VSAN Storage Base Polci “VSAN High Perf”. \u00a0The “VSAN High Perf” is defined as a Number of failures to tolerate of 1, and\u00a0Number of disk stripes per object at 2.<\/p>\n Now you can start the appliance. Look\u00a0closely at the IP addresses of the appliance and the MAC addresses. You want to start configuring the IP Addresses later on the proper NIC.<\/p>\n Using the Synology Assistant you can now see your appliance appear on the network. We are installing the DSM using the Manual install.<\/p>\n Here you upload the DSM 5.1-5022<\/a> pattern file that you retrieved from the Synology download center in the DS3615xs<\/a> selection.<\/p>\n It will now prompt you that it will erase all partitions<\/strong> on the attached disks of the appliance. This includes the XPEnoboot disk of the appliance.<\/p>\n Accordingly the expected behavior now, is that the boot disk is wiped and won’t boot.<\/p>\n Stop the appliance, and using the Datastore browser, you go erase the XPenoboot disk. Upload again for the 2nd time the XPEnoboot_DS3615xs_5.1-5022-3.vmdk in the folder.<\/p>\n 3) Configuration using Synology Assistant<\/strong><\/p>\n You can now restart the appliance. You will notice that the 2nd time the appliance boots, some of the messages like the IP address are not there anymore. And using the Synology Assistant, you see that the DHCP function isn’t started. The IP addresses are now 169.254.x.y<\/p>\n Select the proper network interface in the Synology Assistant using the MAC address, and select Setup. If you don’t select the proper MAC address you might need to change swap IP addresses later. So save yourself some time, and select the eth0 one.<\/p>\n The Admin password at this time is blank, don’t enter any value. You can change the password later.<\/p>\n Refreshing the Synology Assistant shows that you have the proper IP address now.<\/p>\n Time to connect to your newly deploy appliance.<\/p>\n You are now only a few steps away from using your storage appliance.<\/p>\n It is now time to change your admin account password.<\/p>\n<\/a>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>I have selected two CPU and 8GB of memory. Because my appliance won’t do any software RAID, 2 vCPU is more than enough.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>2) Changing\u00a0the Boot disk<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0Use your browser and aim it to the IP address shown in the Synology Assistant to do the initial install.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>The Synology assistant wizard will now start.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>Enter the appliance Network settings.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n