vSphere Storage - ESXi 5.0 - Documentation - VMware
vSphere Storage - ESXi 5.0 - Documentation - VMware
vSphere Storage - ESXi 5.0 - Documentation - VMware
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<strong>vSphere</strong> <strong>Storage</strong><br />
Table 1-3. Datastore Information (Continued)<br />
Datastore Information Description<br />
Path Selection (VMFS datastores) Path selection policy the host uses to access storage. For more information, see<br />
Chapter 17, “Understanding Multipathing and Failover,” on page 151.<br />
Paths (VMFS datastores) Number of paths used to access storage and their status.<br />
Review Datastore Properties<br />
Use the <strong>vSphere</strong> Client to display all datastores available to the hosts and analyze their properties.<br />
Procedure<br />
1 In Inventory, select Hosts and Clusters.<br />
2 Select a host and click the Configuration tab.<br />
3 In Hardware, select <strong>Storage</strong>.<br />
4 Click the Datastores view.<br />
5 To display details for a particular datastore, select the datastore from the list.<br />
How Virtual Machines Access <strong>Storage</strong><br />
When a virtual machine communicates with its virtual disk stored on a datastore, it issues SCSI commands.<br />
Because datastores can exist on various types of physical storage, these commands are encapsulated into other<br />
forms, depending on the protocol that the <strong>ESXi</strong> host uses to connect to a storage device.<br />
<strong>ESXi</strong> supports Fibre Channel (FC), Internet SCSI (iSCSI), Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), and NFS<br />
protocols. Regardless of the type of storage device your host uses, the virtual disk always appears to the virtual<br />
machine as a mounted SCSI device. The virtual disk hides a physical storage layer from the virtual machine’s<br />
operating system. This allows you to run operating systems that are not certified for specific storage equipment,<br />
such as SAN, inside the virtual machine.<br />
The following graphic depicts five virtual machines using different types of storage to illustrate the differences<br />
between each type.<br />
20 <strong>VMware</strong>, Inc.