Emc Infrastructure For Vmware View Reference Architecture

Reference Architecture
EMC® INFRASTRUCTURE FOR

VMWARE® VIEW™ 5.0
EMC VNX™ Series (NFS), VMware vSphere™ 5.0,
VMware View 5.0, and VMware View Composer 2.7
• Simplify management and decrease TCO
• Guarantee a quality desktop experience
• Minimize the risk of virtual desktop deployment
EMC Solutions Group
January 2012
Copyright © 2012 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its

publication date. The information is subject to change without notice.
The information in this publication is provided “as is.” EMC Corporation makes
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Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this

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For the most up-to-date listing of EMC product names, see EMC Corporation
Trademarks on EMC.com.
VMware, ESXi, VMware vCenter, VMware vSphere, and VMware View are
registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States
and/or other jurisdictions.
All trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners.
Part Number h8305.1
EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 2

EMC VNX Series (NFS), VMware vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0, and
VMware View Composer 2.7—Reference Architecture
Table of contents
Reference architecture overview ............................................................................................ 5
Document purpose .......................................................................................................................... 5
Introduction to the EMC VNX series .................................................................................................. 5
Software suites available ............................................................................................................ 5
Software packs available............................................................................................................. 6
Solution purpose ............................................................................................................................. 6
The business challenge.................................................................................................................... 6
The technology solution ................................................................................................................... 7
The solution benefits ....................................................................................................................... 7
Solution architecture ............................................................................................................. 8

Architecture diagram........................................................................................................................ 8
Reference architecture overview....................................................................................................... 8
Storage layout................................................................................................................................ 10
Storage layout overview ................................................................................................................. 10
File system layout overview ............................................................................................................ 11
VNX shared file systems ................................................................................................................. 12
Network layout overview ................................................................................................................ 12
Host network configuration ............................................................................................................ 13
VNX5300 network configuration..................................................................................................... 14
Key components ................................................................................................................. 15

Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 15
EMC VNX series .............................................................................................................................. 15
EMC VNX FAST Cache ..................................................................................................................... 15
VSI for VMware vSphere ................................................................................................................. 16
VMware View 5.0 ........................................................................................................................... 16
VMware vSphere 5.0 ...................................................................................................................... 16
VMware View architecture ................................................................................................... 17

Linked clone overview .................................................................................................................... 17
Automated pool configuration........................................................................................................ 17
High availability and failover ............................................................................................... 18

Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 18
Storage layer .................................................................................................................................. 18
Connectivity layer........................................................................................................................... 18
Host layer....................................................................................................................................... 18
Validated environment profile ............................................................................................. 19

Profile characteristics..................................................................................................................... 19
Hardware and software resources ........................................................................................ 20

Hardware resources ....................................................................................................................... 20
Software resources ........................................................................................................................ 21
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 23
Summary ....................................................................................................................................... 23
Next steps...................................................................................................................................... 23
References .......................................................................................................................... 24
EMC documentation ....................................................................................................................... 24
VMware documentation ................................................................................................................. 24
McAfee documentation .................................................................................................................. 24

Reference architecture overview
Document purpose EMC's commitment to consistently maintain and improve quality is led by the Total
Customer Experience (TCE) program, which is driven by Six Sigma methodologies. As
a result, EMC has built Customer Integration Labs in its Global Solutions Centers to
reflect realworld deployments in which TCE use cases are developed and executed.
These use cases provide EMC with an insight into the challenges currently facing its
customers.
This document describes the reference architecture of the EMC infrastructure for
VMware View 5.0, EMC VNX Series (NFS), VMware vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0,
and VMware View Composer 2.7 solution, which was tested and validated by the
EMC Solutions group.
Introduction to the The VNX series delivers uncompromising scalability and flexibility for the midtier
EMC VNX series while providing market-leading simplicity and efficiency to minimize total cost of
ownership. Customers can benefit from the new VNX features such as:
• Next-generation unified storage, optimized for virtualized applications.

• Extended cache by using Flash drives with Fully Automated Storage Tiering for
Virtual Pools (FAST VP) and FAST Cache that can be optimized for the highest
system performance and lowest storage cost simultaneously on both block
and file.
• Multiprotocol support for file, block, and object with object access through
EMC Atmos™ Virtual Edition (Atmos VE).
• Simplified management with EMC Unisphere™ for a single management
framework for all NAS, SAN, and replication needs.
• Up to three times improvement in performance with the latest Intel Xeon
multicore processor technology, optimized for Flash.
• 6 Gb/s SAS back end with the latest drive technologies supported:
 3.5” 100 GB and 200 GB Flash, 3.5” 300 GB, and 600 GB 15k or 10k rpm
SAS, and 3.5” 1 TB, 2 TB and 3 TB 7.2k rpm NL-SAS
 2.5” 100 GB and 200 GB Flash, 300 GB, 600 GB and 900 GB 10k rpm SAS
• Expanded EMC UltraFlex™ I/O connectivity—Fibre Channel (FC), Internet
Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI), Common Internet File System (CIFS),
network file system (NFS) including parallel NFS (pNFS), Multi-Path File
System (MPFS), and Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) connectivity for
converged networking over Ethernet.
The VNX series includes five new software suites and three new software packs that
make it easier and simpler to attain the maximum overall benefits.
Software suites available

• VNX FAST Suite—Automatically optimizes for the highest system performance
and the lowest storage cost simultaneously (FAST VP is not part of the FAST
Suite for VNX5100™).

• VNX Local Protection Suite—Practices safe data protection and repurposing.
• VNX Remote Protection Suite—Protects data against localized failures,
outages, and disasters.
• VNX Application Protection Suite—Automates application copies and proves
compliance.
• VNX Security and Compliance Suite—Keeps data safe from changes,
deletions, and malicious activity.
Software packs available
• VNX Total Efficiency Pack—Includes all five software suites (not available for
VNX5100).
• VNX Total Protection Pack—Includes local, remote, and application protection
suites.
• VNX Total Value Pack—Includes all three protection software suites and the
Security and Compliance Suite (VNX5100 exclusively supports this package).
Solution purpose The purpose of this reference architecture is to build and demonstrate the
functionality, performance, and scalability of virtual desktops enabled by EMC VNX
series, VMware vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0, and VMware View Composer 2.7.This
solution is built on an EMC VNX5300™ platform with multiprotocol support, which
provides NFS storage for the VMware datastore and CIFS-based storage for the user
data.
This reference architecture validates the performance of the solution and provides
guidelines to build similar solutions.
This document is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to every aspect of this

solution.
The business Customers require a scalable, tiered, and highly available infrastructure to deploy
challenge their virtual desktop environment. Several new technologies are available to assist
them in architecting a virtual desktop solution, but the customers need to know how
best to use these technologies to maximize their investment, support service-level
agreements, and reduce their desktop total cost of ownership.
The purpose of this solution is to build a replica of a common customer virtual desktop
infrastructure (VDI) environment and validate the environment for performance,
scalability, and functionality. Customers will achieve:
• Increased control and security of their global, mobile desktop environment,

typically their most at-risk environment.
• Better end-user productivity with a more consistent environment.
• Simplified management with the environment contained in the data center.
• Better support of service-level agreements and compliance initiatives.
• Lower operational and maintenance costs.

The technology This solution demonstrates how to use an EMC VNX platform to provide storage
solution resources for a robust VMware View 5.0 environment by using Windows 7 virtual
desktops.
Planning and designing the storage infrastructure for VMware View is a critical step as
the shared storage must be able to absorb large bursts of input/output (I/O) that
occur throughout the course of a day. These large I/O bursts can lead to periods of
erratic and unpredictable virtual desktop performance. Users can often adapt to slow
performance, but unpredictable performance will quickly frustrate them.
To provide predictable performance for a VDI environment, the storage must be able
to handle peak I/O load from clients without resulting in high response times.
Designing for this workload involves deploying several disks to handle brief periods
of extreme I/O pressure. Such a deployment is expensive to implement. This solution
uses EMC VNX FAST Cache to reduce the number of disks required.
Traditional host-based antivirus solutions can have a significant impact on all facets
of the virtual desktops environment including storage, networking, and CPU
utilization. To ensure predictable virtual desktop performance and maximize the
number of virtual desktops an enrvironment can run, alternative antivirus solutions
are recommended. This solution uses the McAfee Management for Optimized Virtual
Environments (MOVE) antivirus platform to offload virus scanning tasks to dedicated
hosts and reduce the resources required per desktop.
The solution This solution aids in the design and implementation stages for the successful
benefits deployment of virtual desktops on VMware View 5.0. This solution balances the
performance requirements and cost by using the new features in the VNX Operating
Environment (OE) such as EMC VNX FAST Cache. VNX support for NFS also enables the
use of VMware NFS datastores for cost-effective and easily deployable storage for the
desktop virtualization platform.
Using desktop virtualization provides organizations with additional benefits such as:
• Increased security by centralizing business-critical information

• Increased compliance as information is moved from endpoints into the data
center
• Simplified and centralized management of desktops

Solution architecture
Architecture This solution provides a summary and characterization of the tests performed to
diagram validate the EMC infrastructure for VMware View 5.0, EMC VNX Series (NFS), VMware
vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0, and VMware View Composer 2 solution. It involves
building a 1,000-seat VMware View 5.0 environment on VNX and integrating the new
VNX features to provide a compelling and cost-effective VDI platform.
Figure 1 depicts the overall physical architecture of the solution.
Figure 1. Physical architecture
Reference The reference architecture consists of the following components.

architecture
overview • EMC VNX5300 platform—Provides storage by using IP (NAS) connections for
virtual desktops and infrastructure virtual machines such as VMware View
Manager, VMware vCenter™ Servers, Microsoft SQL Server databases, and
other supporting services. User profiles and home directories are redirected
to CIFS network shares on EMC VNX5300.

• VMware ESXi® 5.0 server—A two-node VMware ESXi 5.0 cluster that hosts
infrastructure virtual machines. Two additional VMware ESXi 5.0 clusters are
used to host 1,000 virtual desktops.
• VMware vCenter Server 5.0—Provides a scalable and extensible platform that
forms the foundation for virtualization management for the VMware ESXi5.0
clusters.
• VMware View Manager 5.0—Provides virtual desktop delivery, authenticates
users, manages the assembly of users' virtual desktop environments, and
brokers connections between users and their virtual desktops. In this
reference architecture, VMware View Manager5.0 is installed on Windows
Server 2008 R2 and hosted as a virtual machine on a VMware vSphere
ESXi 5.0 server.
• Virtual desktops—One thousand virtual desktops running Windows 7 that are
created by using VMware View Composer 2.7 and are deployed as linked
clones.
• McAfee Management for Optimized Virtual Environments (MOVE) 2.0.0—The
McAfee MOVE antivirus platform that replaces traditional host-based antivirus
solutions by offloading virtual desktop virus scanning tasks to dedicated
servers running the McAfee MOVE Antivirus Offload Server software.
• Cisco Nexus 5020 switches— Two Cisco Nexus 5020 switches that provide
high port density, wire-speed performance, and extremely low latency to meet
the growing demand for a 10-gigabit Ethernet network.
• Microsoft Windows 2008 R2 domain controller and DNS server— The
Windows 2008 R2 domain controller that provides Active Directory services to
manage the identities and relationships that constitute the Windows
environment for the virtual desktops. The Domain Name System (DNS)
component of the Windows network infrastructure is also installed on this
server. This server is hosted as a virtual machine on a VMware ESXi 5.0
server.
• Microsoft Windows 2008 R2 dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP)
server—Centrally manages the IP address scheme for virtual desktops. This
service is hosted on the same virtual machine as the domain controller and
DNS server.
• Microsoft SQL Server 2008—The database service required by VMware View
Manager and VMware vCenter Server to store configuration details. This SQL
Server is hosted as a virtual machine on a VMware ESXi5.0 server.
• Mixed 10-gigabit and 1-gigabit IP network—The Ethernet network
infrastructure that provides 10-gigabit connectivity to the VNX storage. The
10-gigabit infrastructure allows ESXi servers to access NFS datastores on
VNX5300 with high bandwidth and low latency. The desktop clients, View
components, and Windows Server infrastructure reside on the 1-gigabit
network.

Storage layout Figure 2 shows the storage layout of the disks in the reference architecture.
Figure 2. Storage layout
Storage layout The following configurations are used in this reference architecture:
overview
• Four SAS disks (0_0 to 0_3) are used for the VNX OE.
• Disks 0_6, 1_5, and 1_6 are hot spares. These disks are denoted as Hot
Spare in the storage layout diagram.
• Two Flash drives (0_4 and 0_5) are used for EMC VNX FAST Cache. There are
no user-configurable LUNs on these drives.
• Fifteen SAS disks (2_0 to 2_14) in a RAID 5 storage pool (Storage Pool 2) are
used to store linked clones and replicas. FAST Cache is enabled for the entire
pool. Six NFS file systems are created and presented to the ESXi servers as
datastores.
• Sixteen NL-SAS disks (0_7 to 0_14 and 1_7 to 1_14) are configured in a RAID
6 (6+2) storage pool (Storage Pool 3) and used to store user data and
roaming profiles. FAST Cache is enabled for the entire pool. Two VNX file
systems are created and presented as Windows file shares.
• Five SAS disks (1_0 to 1_4) in a RAID 5 storage pool (Storage Pool 1) are used
to store infrastructure virtual machines. A 1-TB LUN is carved out of the pool
to form an NFS file system. The file system is presented to the ESXi servers as
a datastore.

File system layout Figure 3 shows the layout of the file system.
overview
Figure 3. File system layout
Fifteen LUNs of 200 GB each are carved out of a storage pool configured with 15 SAS
drives. The LUNs are presented to VNX File as dvols that belong to a system-defined
pool. Six file systems are then carved out of an Automatic Volume Management
(AVM) system pool and are presented to the ESXi servers as datastores. File systems
1 and 2 are used to store replicas. File systems 3 to 6 are used to store the linked
clones. A total of 1,000 desktops are created and each replica is responsible for 500
linked clones.
Starting from VNX for File version 7.0.35.3, AVM is enhanced to intelligently stripe
across dvols that belong to the same block-based storage pool. It is not required to
manually create striped volumes and add them to the user-defined file-based pools.
Like the NFS file systems, the CIFS file systems are provisioned from an AVM system
pool to store user home directories and user roaming profiles. The two file systems
are grouped in the same storage pool because their I/O profiles are sequential.

Figure 4 shows the layout of the CIFS file systems.
Figure 4. VNX5300 – CIFS file system layout
Twenty LUNs of 360 GB each are carved out of the RAID 6 storage pool configured
with 16 NL-SAS-drives. Sixteen drives are used because the block-based storage pool
internally creates 6+2 RAID 6 groups. Therefore, the number of NL-SAS drives used is
a multiple of eight. Likewise, twenty LUNs are used because AVM stripes across five
dvols, so the number of dvols is a multiple of five.
FAST Cache is enabled on both storage pools that are used to store the NFS and CIFS
file systems.
VNX shared file Two shared file systems are used by the virtual desktops—one for user profiles and
systems the other to redirect user storage that resides in home directories. In general,
redirecting users’ data out of the base image to VNX for File enables centralized
administration, backup and recovery, and makes the desktops more stateless. Each
file system is exported to the environment through a CIFS share.
Network layout Figure 5 shows the 10-gigabit Ethernet connectivity between the Cisco Nexus 5020
overview switches and the EMC VNX storage. Uplink Ethernet ports coming off the Nexus
switches can be used to connect to a 10-gigabit or a 1-gigabit external LAN. In this
solution, the 1-gigabit LAN through Cisco Catalyst 6509 switches is used to extend
Ethernet connectivity to the desktop clients, VMware View components, and Windows
Server infrastructure.

Figure 5. Network layout diagram
Host network All network interfaces on the ESXi servers in this solution use 1-gigabit Ethernet
configuration connections. All virtual desktops are assigned IP addresses by using a DHCP server.
The Intel-based servers use four onboard Broadcom gigabit Ethernet controllers for all
the network connections.
Figure 6 shows the vSwitch configuration in the vCenter Server.
Figure 6. vSwitch configuration in vCenter Server

Virtual switches use vSwitch0 and vSwitch1 use two physical network interface cards
(NICs) each.
Table 1 lists the port groups configured onvSwitch0 and vSwitch1.
Table 1. Port groups configured on vSwitch0 and vSwitch1

Virtual Configured port Used for
switch groups
vSwitch0 Service console VMkernel port for ESXi host management
vSwitch0 VLAN277 Network connection for virtual desktops and
LAN traffic
vSwitch1 NFS NFS datastore traffic
VNX5300 network EMC VNX5300 consists of two Data Movers. The Data Movers can be configured in an
configuration active/active or an active/passive configuration. In the active/passive configuration,
the passive Data Mover serves as a failover device for the active Data Mover. In this
solution, the Data Movers operate in the active/passive mode.
The VNX5300 Data Movers are configured for two 10-gigabit interfaces on a single I/O
module. Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) is used to configure ports fxg-1-0
and fxg-1-1 to support virtual machine traffic, home folder access, and external
access for roaming profiles.
Figure 7 shows the back of two VNX5300 Data Movers that include two 10-gigabit
fiber Ethernet (fxg) ports each in I/O expansion slot 1.
Figure 7. VNX5300 Data Movers

Key components
Introduction This section briefly describes the key components of this solution:
• EMC VNX series

• EMC VNX FAST Cache
• VSI for VMware vSphere
• VMware View 5.0
• VMware vSphere 5.0
The Hardware and software resources section provides more information on the
components that make up the solution.
EMC VNX series The EMC VNX series is a dedicated network server optimized for file and block storage
access that delivers high-end features in a scalable, easy-to-use package.
The VNX series delivers a single-box block and file solution, which offers a centralized
point of management for distributed environments. This makes it possible to
dynamically grow, share, and cost-effectively manage multiprotocol file systems and
provide multiprotocol block access. Administrators can take advantage of the
simultaneous support for NFS and CIFS protocols by enabling Windows and
Linux/UNIX clients to share files by using the sophisticated file-locking mechanism of
VNX for File and VNX for Block for high-bandwidth or for latency-sensitive
applications.
EMC VNX FAST VNX FAST Cache, a part of the VNX FAST Suite, uses Flash drives as an expanded
Cache cache layer for the array. The VNX5300 is configured with two 100 GB Flash drives in
a RAID 1 configuration for a 93 GB read/write-capable cache. This is the minimum
amount of FAST Cache. Larger configurations are supported for scaling beyond 1,000
desktops.
FAST Cache is an array-wide feature available for both file and block storage. FAST
Cache works by examining 64-KB chunks of data in FAST Cache-enabled objects on
the array. Frequently accessed data is copied to the FAST Cache and subsequent
accesses to the data chunk are serviced by FAST Cache. This enables immediate
promotion of very active data to the Flash drives. The use of Flash drives dramatically
improves the response times for very active data and reduces data hot spots that can
occur within the LUN.
FAST Cache is an extended read/write cache that enables VMware View to deliver
consistent performance at Flash-drive speeds by absorbing read-heavy activities,
such as boot storms and antivirus scans, and write-heavy workloads such as
operating system patches and application updates. This extended read/write cache
is an ideal caching mechanism for View Composer because the base replica desktop
image and other active user data that are frequently accessed are serviced directly
from the Flash drives without having to access the slower drives at the lower storage
tier.

VSI for VMware EMC Virtual Storage Integrator (VSI) for VMware vSphere is a plug-in to the vSphere
vSphere Client that provides a single management interface for managing EMC storage within
the vSphere environment. Features can be added and removed from VSI
independently, which provides flexibility to customize VSI user environments. The
features are managed by using the VSI Feature Manager. VSI provides a unified user
experience that allows new features to be introduced rapidly in response to changing
customer requirements.
The following VSI features were used during the validation testing:
• Storage Viewer (SV)—Extends the vSphere client to facilitate the discovery

and identification of EMC VNX storage devices that are allocated to VMware
ESXi hosts and virtual machines. SV presents the underlying storage details
to the virtual datacenter administrator, merging the data of several different
storage mapping tools into a few seamless vSphere client views.
• Unified Storage Management—Simplifies storage administration of the EMC
VNX platforms. It enables VMware administrators to provision new NFS and
VMFS datastores and RDM volumes seamlessly within the vSphere client.
The EMC VSI for VMware vSphere product guides available on the EMC Online
Support website, provide more information.
VMware View 5.0 VMware View 5.0 is the leading desktop virtualization solution that enables desktops
to deliver cloud computing services to users. VMware View 5.0 integrates effectively
with vSphere 5.0 to provide:
• View Composer 2.7 performance optimization—Optimizes storage utilization

and performance by reducing the footprint of virtual desktops and by using
tiered storage.
• Tiered storage support—View Composer 2.7 supports the use of different tiers
of storage to maximize performance and reduce cost.
• Thin provisioning support—Enables efficient allocation of storage resources
when virtual desktops are provisioned. This results in better utilization of
storage infrastructure and reduced capital expenditure (CAPEX)/operating
expenditure (OPEX).
VMware vSphere VMware vSphere 5.0 is the market-leading virtualization platform that is used across
5.0 thousands of IT environments around the world. VMware vSphere 5.0 can transform
or virtualize computer hardware resources including CPU, RAM, hard disks, and
network controllers to create a fully functional virtual machine, each of which runs its
own operating system and applications just like a physical computer.
The high-availability features of VMware vSphere 5.0along with Distributed Resource

Scheduler (DRS) and Storage vMotion® enable seamless migration of virtual desktops
from one ESXiserver to another with minimal or no disruption to the customer.

VMware View architecture
Linked clone VMware View 5.0 with View Composer 2.7 uses the concept of linked clones to
overview quickly provision virtual desktops. This reference architecture uses the tiered storage
feature of View Composer 2.7 to build linked clones and their replica images on
separate datastores, as shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8. Linked clones and replica images
The operating system reads all the common data from the read-only replica and the
unique data that is created by the operating system or useris stored on the linked
clone. Figure 9 shows a logical representation of this relationship.
Figure 9. Logical representation of replica disk and linked clone
Automated pool All 1,000 desktops are deployed in two automated desktop pools by using a common
configuration Windows 7 master image. Two dedicated datastores are used for the replica images,
and the linked clones are spread across four datastores.

High availability and failover
Introduction This solution provides a highly available virtual desktop infrastructure. Each
component is configured to provide a robust and scalable solution for the host layer,
connectivity layer, and storage layer.
Storage layer The VNX series is designed for five 9s availability by using redundant components in
the array. All Data Movers, storage processors, and array components are capable of
continued operation in case of a hardware failure. The RAID disk configuration on the
VNX back end provides protection against data lossdue to hard disk failures. The
available hot spare drives can be dynamically allocated to replace a failing disk.
Connectivity layer The advanced networking features of VNX series, such as Fail-Safe Network (FSN) and
link aggregation, provide protection against network connection failures at the array.
Each ESXi host has multiple connections to both the Ethernet networks to protect
against link failures. These connections are spread across multiple blades in an
Ethernet switch to protect against component failure in the switch.
Host layer The application hosts have redundant power supplies and network connections to
reduce the impact of component failures in the ESXiservers. VMwarehigh availability
(HA) is configured on the cluster to help recover virtual desktops quickly in case of a
complete host failure.

Validated environment profile
Profile Table 2 provides the environment profile that was used to validate the solution.
characteristics
Table 2. Profile characteristics
Profile characteristic Value
Number of virtual desktops 1,000
Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 (32-

Virtual desktop OS
bit)
CPU per virtual desktop 1 vCPU
• Cluster A—7.81
Number of virtual desktops per CPU core
• Cluster B—5.95
RAM per virtual desktop 1 GB
Average storage available for each virtual desktop 2 GB (vmdk and vswap)
Average IOPS per virtual desktop at steady state 9.8
Average peak IOPS per virtual desktop during boot

40
storm
Number of datastores used to store linked clones 4
Number of datastores used to store replicas 2
Number of virtual desktops per datastore 250
RAID 5, 300 GB, 15k rpm, 3.5 in.

Disk and RAID type for datastores
SAS disks
Disk and RAID type for CIFS shares to host roaming user RAID 6, 2 TB, 7,200 rpm, 3.5 in.
profiles and home directories NL-SAS disks
Number of VMware clusters 2
• Cluster A—8
Number of ESXi servers in each cluster
• Cluster B—7
Number of virtual desktops in each cluster 500

Hardware and software resources
Hardware Table 3 lists the hardware used to validate the solution.
resources
Table 3. Hardware details
Hardware Quantity Configuration Notes
EMC VNX5300 1 Two Data Movers VNX shared storage
(active/passive)
Three disk-array
enclosures (DAEs)
configured with:
• Twenty five 300 GB,
15k-rpm 3.5-in SAS
disks
• Seventeen 2 TB,
7,200 rpm 3.5 in. NL-
SAS disks
• Three 100 GB, 3.5
inch Flash drives
Intel-based 10 • Memory: 72 GB of 8 servers—Virtual

servers RAM desktops ESXi
cluster 1
• CPU: Two Intel Xeon
X5550 with 2.77-GHz 2 servers—ESXi
quad core processors cluster to host
infrastructure
• Internal storage: One
virtual machines
73 GB internal SAS
disk
• External storage:
VNX5300 (NFS)
• NIC: Quad-port
Broadcom BCM5709
1000Base-T adapters
Intel-based 7 • Memory: 72 GB of Virtual desktops

servers RAM ESXi cluster 2
• CPU: Two Intel Xeon
X5650 with 2.77 GHz
hex core processors
• Internal storage: One
73 GB internal SAS
disk
• External storage:
VNX5300 (NFS)
• NIC: Quad-port
Broadcom BCM5709
1000Base-T adapters

Hardware Quantity Configuration Notes
Cisco Catalyst 2 • WS-6509-E switch 1-gigabit host
6509 connections
• WS-x6748 1-gigabit
distributed over two
line cards
line cards
• WS-SUP720-3B
supervisor
Cisco Nexus 5020 2 Forty 100-gigabit ports Redundant LAN A/B

configuration
Software resources Table 4 lists the software used to validate the solution.
Table 4. Solution software

Software Configuration
VNX5300 (shared storage, file systems)
VNX OE for File Release 7.0.40.0
VNX OE for Block Release 31 (05.31.000.5.502)
VSI for VMware vSphere: Unified Storage Version 5.0.0.61

Management
VSI for VMware vSphere: Storage Viewer Version 5.0
Cisco Nexus
Cisco Nexus 5020 Version 4.2(1)N1(1)
ESXi servers
ESXi ESXi 5.0.0 (474610)
EMC vSphere Storage APIs for Array Version 1.0-10

Integration (VAAI) Plug-in
vCenter Server
OS Windows 2008 R2 SP1
VMware vCenter Server 5.0
VMware View Manager 5.0
VMware View Composer 2.7
Virtual desktops
Note: This software is used to generate the test load.
OS MS Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 (32-bit)
VMware tools 8.6.0 build-425873
Microsoft Office Office Enterprise 2007 (Version

12.0.6562.5003)

Software Configuration
Internet Explorer 8.0.7601.17514
Adobe Reader 9.1.0
McAfee Virus Scan 8.7 Enterprise
McAfee MOVE Antivirus 2.0.0
Adobe Flash Player 11
Bullzip PDF Printer 6.0.0.865
Login VSI (VDI workload generator) 3.0 Professional Edition

Conclusion
Summary The features of the VNX operating environment enable EMC VNX series arrays to drive
higher storage consolidation ratios at a lower cost than was previously possible. This
reduces the capital expenditure on equipment and lowers the operational costs
required to support the placement, power, and cooling of the storage arrays.
The McAfee MOVE antivirus platform reduces the overall server and storage resources
required per virtual desktop by offloading CPU, RAM, and storage-intensive virus
scanning tasks to dedicated servers running the MOVE Antivirus Offload Server
software. In addition, the McAfee MOVE Offload Server only scans files that it has not
previously scanned, regardless of the virtual desktop that makes the request. This
greatly reduces the overall number of virus scans and resources required per virtual
desktop when compared with traditional host-based antivirus solutions.
This reference architecture provides a blueprint for a validated VMware View 5.0
virtualization solution enabled by EMC VNX storage and the VMware vSphere 5.0
virtualization platform. The solution is able to support and scale to thousands of
virtual desktops.
Next steps EMC can help accelerate assessment, design, implementation, and management
while lowering the implementation risks for an EMC infrastructure for virtual desktops
enabled by EMC VNX Series (NFS), VMware vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0, and
VMware View Composer 2.7.
To learn more about this and other solutions, contact an EMC representative.

References
EMC The following documents, located on the EMC Online Support website, provide
documentation additional and relevant information. Access to these documents depends on your
login credentials. If you do not have access to a document, contact your EMC
representative:
• EMC Infrastructure for Virtual Desktops Enabled by EMC VNX Series
(NFS),VMware vSphere 4.1, VMware View 4.6, and VMware View Composer
2.6—Reference Architecture
• EMC Performance Optimization for Microsoft Windows XP for the Virtual
Desktop Infrastructure—Applied Best Practices
• Deploying Microsoft Windows 7 Virtual Desktops with VMware View—Applied
Best Practices Guide
• EMC Infrastructure For Virtual Desktops Enabled by EMC VNX Series
(NFS),VMware vSphere 4.1, VMware View 4.6, and VMware View Composer
2.6—Proven Solution Guide
• EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0, EMC VNX Series (NFS), VMware
vSphere 5.0, VMware View 5.0, and VMware View Composer 2.7—Proven
Solutions Guide
VMware The following VMware documents, located on the VMware website, also provide
documentation useful information:
• VMware View Architecture Planning

• VMware View Installation
• VMware View Administration
• VMware View Security
• VMware View Upgrades
• VMware View Integration
• VMware View Windows XP Deployment Guide
• VMware View Optimization Guide for Windows 7
McAfee The following documents, located on the McAfee website, also provide useful
documentation information:
• McAfee MOVE Antivirus 2.0.0 Product Guide
• McAfee MOVE Antivirus 2.0.0 Software Release Notes
• McAfee MOVE Antivirus 2.0.0 Deployment Guide


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Reference Architecture

EMC® INFRASTRUCTURE FOR

EMC Solutions Group

EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its

Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this

Part Number h8305.1

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 2

Solution architecture ............................................................................................................. 8

Key components ................................................................................................................. 15

VMware View architecture ................................................................................................... 17

High availability and failover ............................................................................................... 18

Validated environment profile ............................................................................................. 19

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 3

Hardware and software resources ........................................................................................ 20

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 4

• Next-generation unified storage, optimized for virtualized applications.

Software suites available

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 5

This document is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to every aspect of this

• Increased control and security of their global, mobile desktop environment,

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 6

• Increased security by centralizing business-critical information

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 7

Figure 1 depicts the overall physical architecture of the solution.

Figure 1. Physical architecture

Reference The reference architecture consists of the following components.

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 8

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 9

Figure 2. Storage layout

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 10

Figure 3. File system layout

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 11

Figure 4. VNX5300 – CIFS file system layout

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 12

Figure 6 shows the vSwitch configuration in the vCenter Server.

Figure 6. vSwitch configuration in vCenter Server

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 13

Table 1 lists the port groups configured onvSwitch0 and vSwitch1.

Table 1. Port groups configured on vSwitch0 and vSwitch1

Figure 7. VNX5300 Data Movers

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 14

• EMC VNX series

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 15

• Storage Viewer (SV)—Extends the vSphere client to facilitate the discovery

• View Composer 2.7 performance optimization—Optimizes storage utilization

The high-availability features of VMware vSphere 5.0along with Distributed Resource

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 16

Figure 8. Linked clones and replica images

Figure 9. Logical representation of replica disk and linked clone

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 17

EMC Infrastructure for VMware View 5.0 18

Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 (32-

CPU per virtual desktop 1 vCPU

RAM per virtual desktop 1 GB

Average IOPS per virtual desktop at steady state 9.8

Average peak IOPS per virtual desktop during boot

Number of datastores used to store linked clones 4

Number of datastores used to store replicas 2

Number of virtual desktops per datastore 250