Configure VM disks for VMware

Disk allocation types

Abiquo supports thin provisioning and thick provisioning as disk allocation types. By default, Abiquo uses thin provisioning, which is more efficient and lets you resize VM disks.

You can set the allocation type in the VM template, and in the VM, before you deploy the VM, if you have the privilege to Manage allocation type when attaching a disk.

VM disk controllers

Abiquo supports IDE, SCSI, and SATA controllers. By default for ESXi, Abiquo will use SCSI and IDE drivers.

When you load a template using an OVA or OVF file, Abiquo can obtain the controller type, and for SCSI, the controller.

In the Abiquo UI, you can configure the controller type and SCSI controller for VM templates and for VMs, if you have the privilege to Manage virtual storage controller.

To set the default and the allowed controllers, use Abiquo configuration properties for .pluginmetadata.diskControllers . For an example, see below how to Make SATA the default controller.

To restrict the controllers that users can select or force the use of a single controller, configure the Abiquo UI. See https://wiki.abiquo.com/display/doc/Display+custom+list+of+controllers+when+adding+virtual+disk+to+VM

Make SATA the default controller

To make SATA the default controller:

1. On the Remote Services server, edit the abiquo.properties file

2. Set the pluginmetadata disk controller property for VMware to change to a priority order with SATA first, such as:

   abiquo.pluginmetadata.{hypervisor_type}.diskControllers=SATA,SCSI,IDE

   Replace hypervisor_type in the property key with the code for your hypervisor type:

   1. vmx_04 for vCenter

   2. vcenter_cluster for vCenter clusters

3. Restart the Tomcat server

To move a VM from an IDE controller to a SATA controller, you must first power off the VM.

SCSI controllers for VM disks

Abiquo supports the following SCSI controllers. Users can work with multiple controllers and change the controller before or after deploying a VM. If a controller menu does not display, the user can enter a value from the ResourceSubType column to select the controller.

To use SCSI controllers, when you create VM templates, check that they have SCSI controllers installed.

The priority for the selection of the controllers is:

1. User selection in VM (requires the privilege to Manage virtual storage controller)

2. Administrator selection in VM template

3. The default configuration set by the administrator in the abiquo.properties file on Remote Services

   # Default VirtualSCSIController implementation when diskController is not # specified. Valid values [lsilogic, paravirtual, bus, sas] #abiquo.esxi.scsicontroller=lsilogic

4. LSI Logic Parallel SCSI controller

SATA controllers for VM disks

The full configuration of SATA controllers is described at: Configure SATA for VMware hypervisors.

That page describes:

• How to make SATA ISOs the default for cloud-init

• How to make SATA the default controller for ISO

• How to disable SATA controllers

• Limitations and notes about SATA support.

ISO disks

Abiquo supports ISO disks on SATA and IDE controllers.

The following pages describe this functionality:

• Upload an ISO disk from the local filesystem

• How to work with ISO disks

• Eject a CD-ROM on ESXi

• Skip disk size requests for ISO files when retrieving VMs

When you capture a VM, Abiquo will detect a passthrough drive as an ISO without a disk size.

Resize VM hard disks on ESXi

To resize hard disks of VMs running on ESXi using Abiquo:

1. The disks must be:

   1. SCSI disks on SCSI controller or SATA disks on SATA controllers

   2. Thin provisioned

2. The VM must not have any VMware snapshots.

Also note that:

• You cannot modify disk size and position at the same time.

• You cannot resize the primary disk of a VM that is not allocated (not deployed)

See https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1016192