Amongst all the new features introduced with vSphere 5, VMware increased the virtual hardware limits for virtual machines. What has so far been referred as “Monster VM” or “Super VM” is VMware’s ultimate move to help organizations to virtualize business-critical applications.
- Virtual Machine Hardware Version: 8
- 32 virtual CPUs
- 1 TB virtual RAM
- 2 TB virtual disk
- 3D Graphic Support
- USB 3.0 Devices
- EFI BIOS
- etc
In addition to the virtual machine maximums above vSPhere 5 introduced changes to the Paravirtual SCSI adapter that now also supports boot disks. Paravirtual SCSI adapter promises reduced CPU cycle’s consumption and increase throughput for intensive workloads.
In a VDI context I don’t foresee use cases for such a Monster VM, but only time will tell. Perhaps Graphic intensive applications that require abundance CPU with large amount of disks for swap could be amongst of the first.
Anyway, I thought would be inspirational to create a Monster VM and demonstrate it here.
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Eugene
07/14/2011 at 8:40 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Let me guess how it will cost in licenses to run such VM
Greg
07/14/2011 at 9:33 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
That’s one hell of a home lab you have now
EMC has been good to you
Duncan
07/14/2011 at 10:14 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
where’s the 64TB Physical RDM?
Jason
07/15/2011 at 7:36 am (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Way to many or maybe we just don’t understand the benefit to the bent over customer it gives us.
Jason
07/15/2011 at 7:37 am (UTC -7) Link to this comment
In reference to Eugene’s post.
Rotem Agmon
07/15/2011 at 11:25 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Great post Andre, I’m also super jealous of your lab setup
Now this is what I call raw power!
BTW: ESX 4.0 Update 1 already supports boot disks using Paravirtual SCSI adapter (see http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1010398)
Dan
07/18/2011 at 7:56 am (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Very cool but will cost $76,890 in vSphere licensing fees (22 Enterprise Plus licenses). Neat but no thanks.
Andre Leibovici
07/19/2011 at 3:39 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
@Dan
Not if your organization has a ELA with VMware. I agree with you, however most likelly any companies running such large VM will have ELA with VMware.
Andre Leibovici
07/19/2011 at 3:40 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
@Rotem Agmon
Thanks for the update on Paravirtual SCSI adapter and for commenting on the blog.
Don Gray
03/01/2012 at 5:10 am (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Just set up my own yesterday:
24 virtual processors
48 GB of ram
Running a gentoo linux vm.
Speed? Compiles a linux kerenel, modules and ramdisk in about 65 seconds.
CryptoKnight
09/28/2012 at 11:33 am (UTC -7) Link to this comment
Q: Even if it was $77,000 in licensing, how much does a TB of RAM cost?
A: Near a million dollars. Yes, I know that they are over-provisioning, but still.
If you are in the position to buy a server with greater than 32 CPU’s and
greater than 512 GB RAM you can afford the software licensing, even without
the Enterprise Licensing Agreement with EMC/VMware =)
Welcome to vSphere-land! » vSphere 5 Links
07/14/2011 at 8:16 pm (UTC -7) Link to this comment
[...] 5 and Cloud Infrastructure Suite introduced (ESX Virtualization) VMware vSphere 5 (Knudt Blog) My first vSphere 5 “Monster VM” (My Virtual Cloud) vSphere 5 – New Training Courses: What’s New [V5.0] and VCP5 (NTPro.nl) [...]