For more information about the VMware Management Interface, go to www.vmware.com/support/esx2/doc/.
Configuring a GSX Virtual Machine's Virtual Disks
Configuring a GSX Virtual Machine's Virtual Disks
When you configure an existing virtual disk, you can change its disk mode. You can
also change the virtual disk a virtual machine uses or create a new virtual disk for the
virtual machine.
For an explanation of disk modes, see Understanding Disk Modes below.
To configure an existing virtual disk, make sure the virtual machine is powered off,
then complete the following steps.
- To configure an existing virtual disk, on the Hardware page, under Virtual Disk, click Edit. The Virtual Disk page appears.
To add a new virtual disk, on the Hardware page, click Add Device. The Add
Device Wizard starts. Click Hard Disk. The Virtual Disk Type page appears.
- Do one of the following:
- For an existing virtual disk that is not a physical disk on a LUN, you can change its disk mode. Under Disk Mode, click Persistent, Nonpersistent, Undoable or Append.
- To select a different virtual disk, do the following.
- Choose the location of the virtual disk you want to use. In the VMFS Volume list, choose the volume on which the virtual disk is located.
- In the VMware Disk Image list, select the virtual disk you want. The size of the virtual disk appears in the Capacity field.
- Choose the disk mode. Under Disk Mode, click Persistent, Nonpersistent, Undoable or Append.
- To create a new virtual disk for a virtual machine that does not have a physical disk on a LUN, do the following.
- Choose the location for the new virtual disk. In the VMFS Volume list, choose the volume on which to locate the virtual disk. The amount of free space is listed next to the volume name, so you know how large you can make the virtual disk.
- Give the virtual disk a name. In the VMware Disk Image list, select Other, then specify the disk name, making sure the file has a .dsk extension. Click OK to continue creating the disk.
- Specify the size of the virtual disk. In the Capacity field, specify the size of the virtual disk in MB.
- Choose the disk mode. Under Disk Mode, click Persistent, Nonpersistent, Undoable or Append.
- If the virtual disk is a physical disk on a LUN, you can do the following.
- To select a different physical disk on a LUN to use, select it in the System LUN/Disk list.
- Change the virtual device node. Select the appropriate SCSI ID in the Virtual SCSI Node list.
Note: If the virtual disk is on SCSI controller 0:0, a warning appears, stating
that changing the SCSI node may cause the virtual machine to boot
improperly.
Note: If you want to add more than six disks to the same controller (up to
eight more), you must edit the virtual machine's configuration file directly.
Device ID 7 is used by the SCSI controller, so you cannot use that ID for a
virtual disk. For more information on adding virtual SCSI disks, see
www.vmware.com/support/esx2/doc/esx20admin_modvm_running.html.
- OK to save your changes and close the window.
To add a new virtual disk to a virtual machine, make sure the virtual machine is
powered off, then complete the following steps.
- On the Hardware page, click Add Device. The Add Device Wizard starts.
- Click Hard Disk. The Virtual Disk Type page appears.
- Create one of the following virtual disks:
- Click Blank to create a new virtual disk. Then specify the following.
- Choose the location for the new virtual disk. In the VMFS Volume list, choose the volume on which to locate the virtual disk. The amount of free space is listed next to the volume name, so you know how large you can make the virtual disk.
- Give the virtual disk a name. In the VMware Disk Image list, select Other, then specify the disk name, making sure the file has a .dsk extension. Click OK to continue creating the disk.
- Specify the size of the virtual disk. In the Capacity field, specify the size of the virtual disk in MB. The default entry indicates the amount of free space available on the volume.
- Specify the virtual device node. Select the appropriate SCSI ID in the Virtual SCSI Node list.
- Choose the disk mode. Under Disk Mode, click Persistent, Nonpersistent, Undoable or Append.
- Click Existing to add an existing virtual disk to the virtual machine. Then specify the following.
- Choose the location of the virtual disk you want to use. In the VMFS Volume list, choose the volume on which the virtual disk is located.
- In the VMware Disk Image list, select the virtual disk you want. The size of the virtual disk appears in the Capacity field.
- Specify the virtual device node. Select the appropriate SCSI ID in the Virtual SCSI Node list.
- Choose the disk mode. Under Disk Mode, click Persistent, Nonpersistent, Undoable or Append.
- Click System LUN/Disk to allow the virtual machine to access a physical disk stored on a LUN. Then specify the following.
- Choose the LUN you want to use in the Storage Controller LUN list.
- Specify the virtual device node. Select the appropriate SCSI ID in the Virtual SCSI Node list.
- Click OK to add the disk.
Understanding Disk Modes
ESX Server can use disks in four different modes: persistent, nonpersistent, undoable
and append.
- Persistent: Persistent disks behave exactly like conventional disk drives on a computer. All writes to a persistent disk are written out permanently to the disk as soon as the guest operating system writes the data.
- Nonpersistent: All changes to a nonpersistent mode disk are discarded after that ESX Server session is powered down.
- Undoable: When you use undoable mode, you have the option later of keeping or discarding changes you have made during a working session when you power off the virtual machine. Until you decide, the changes are saved in a redo-log file.
- Append: VMware ESX Server supports an additional append mode for virtual disks stored as VMFS files. Like undoable mode, append mode maintains a redo log. However, in this mode, no dialog appears when the virtual machine is powered off to ask whether you want to commit changes. All changes are continually appended to the redo log. At any point, the changes can be undone by removing the redo log. You should shut down the guest operating system and power off the virtual machine before deleting that virtual machine's redo log. You can also commit the changes to the main virtual disk file using the commit option in vmkfstools.