Suitable storage hardware for VMWare Workstation Player

[talksr]

Hi there,

I have got quite into using VMWare Workstation player on my desktop system to create server and client systems to mess about with and learn from.

 

My desktop system has 32gig of ram and an i7 processor, so is well equipped but it runs an SSD hard drive which is not ideal for the virtual images. It does have a 500gb standard secondary drive, but this has lots of images stored on it.

 

Can anyone suggest something external that would be suitable? Presumably, if it had fast enough network connectivity, I could access the VMWare virtual images stored on it from another system, should my main one be busy doing something else?

 

Note: I am using the free version of VMware.

[Arthur]

but it runs an SSD hard drive which is not ideal for the virtual images.

SSHD (Hybrid Drive) or an actual SSD?

 

I run all of my VMs at home from SSDs and it's perfectly fine. I wouldn't want to go back to using HDDs because they are soooooooooooooooo slow.

 

https://twitter.com/jarwidmark/status/829835309793890304

https://twitter.com/jarwidmark/status/839964152705810432

 

 

Can anyone suggest something external that would be suitable?

http://www.virten.net/2017/03/vmware-homeserver-esxi-on-7th-gen-intel-nuc-kaby-lake/

http://www.virten.net/2017/01/preview-on-7th-gen-kaby-lake-intel-nuc

 

or

 

amazon.co.uk/dp/B074MCM721 / B01AAKZRU2 (if you want to use your existing PC and the current SSD doesn't have enough disk space).

[talksr]

Hi there,

Thanks very much for your detailed reply, very helpful, particularly the links.

In answer to your question; my SSD is an actual SSD but it will be woefully small. It is a SanDisk SSD Plus Solid State Drive (120gb).

I have an HP EliteDesk G1 800 which has this SSD as the OS drive and then a 500g Seagate conventional drive for My Docs redetection (has about 400gb of pics on it).

 

I like your suggestion, I have used ESXi quite a lot (I have the free edu version of that too), so this is definitely a potential option. I wonder if it would work on one of the HP Microservers such as one of these:

https://ddevices.com/p9b70a.html?gclid=CjwKCAjwranNBRBhEiwASu908MlsaX1I6NmKFot4mCxd7LvLWZQAMVWhoNiDUQVjaMPuSbLlDuB0OxoCAnAQAvD_BwE

Will have to do some research and see if I could beef one up enough to do what I need. Ideally, it would need an i7 processor and as much ram as possible.

Thanks very much for getting the ball rolling on this 

 

 

 

SSHD (Hybrid Drive) or an actual SSD?

 

I run all of my VMs at home from SSDs and it's perfectly fine. I wouldn't want to go back to using HDDs because they are soooooooooooooooo slow.

 

https://twitter.com/jarwidmark/status/829835309793890304

https://twitter.com/jarwidmark/status/839964152705810432

 

 

 

VMware Homeserver ? ESXi on 7th Gen Intel NUC (Kaby Lake) | Virten.net

http://www.virten.net/2017/01/preview-on-7th-gen-kaby-lake-intel-nuc

 

or

 

amazon.co.uk/dp/B074MCM721 / B01AAKZRU2 (if you want to use your existing PC and the current SSD doesn't have enough disk space).

Edited September 2, 2017 by talksr

[Arthur]

I wonder if it would work on one of the HP Microservers such as one of these

I have one of those, although I am thinking of selling it because it's not possible to install more than 16GB RAM.

 

7th gen. NUCs on the other hand can take 32GB RAM (like the new Gen. 10 Microserver).

 

Is buying a larger SSD for your current desktop an option?

 

Will have to do some research and see if I could beef one up enough to do what I need.

While you can upgrade the processor in the Gen. 8 Microserver (see the links below), the faster Xeons are expensive and quite hard to find now.

 

https://homeservershow.com/forums/topic/5639-proliant-microserver-gen8-links/ (scroll down to the section titled "CPU’s that have been confirmed upgraded/installed")

https://homeservershow.com/forums/topic/6596-hp-microserver-gen8-processor-faq/

 

I upgraded the Celeron G1610T that mine came with a Core i3-3240 I purchased from eBay since it was cheaper doing it that way.

Edited September 4, 2017 by Arthur