7.0

Configure View Storage Accelerator for View Composer Linked
Clones
You can configure View Composer linked-clone desktop pools to enable ESXi hosts to cache virtual machine
disk data. This feature, called View Storage Accelerator, uses the Content Based Read Cache (CBRC) feature
in ESXi hosts. View Storage Accelerator can reduce IOPS and improve performance during boot storms,
when many machines start up or run anti-virus scans at once. The feature is also beneficial when
administrators or users load applications or data frequently. To use this feature, you must make sure that
View Storage Accelerator is enabled for individual desktop pools.
NOTE For instant clones, this feature is automatically enabled and is not configurable.
When a virtual machine is created, View indexes the contents of each virtual disk file. The indexes are stored
in a virtual machine digest file. At runtime, the ESXi host reads the digest files and caches common blocks of
data in memory. To keep the ESXi host cache up to date, View regenerates the digest files at specified
intervals and when the virtual machine is recomposed. You can modify the regeneration interval.
View Storage Accelerator is enabled for a pool by default. The feature can be disabled or enabled when you
create or edit a pool. The best approach is to enable this feature when you first create a desktop pool. If you
enable the feature by editing an existing pool, you must ensure that a new replica and its digest disks are
created before linked clones are provisioned. You can create a new replica by recomposing the pool to a new
snapshot or rebalancing the pool to a new datastore. Digest files can only be configured for the virtual
machines in a desktop pool when they are powered off.
You can enable View Storage Accelerator on pools that contain linked clones and pools that contain full
virtual machines.
View Storage Accelerator is now qualified to work in configurations that use View replica tiering, in which
replicas are stored on a separate datastore than linked clones. Although the performance benefits of using
View Storage Accelerator with View replica tiering are not materially significant, certain capacity-related
benefits might be realized by storing the replicas on a separate datastore. Hence, this combination is tested
and supported.
IMPORTANT If you plan to use this feature and you are using multiple View pods that share some ESXi hosts,
you must enable the View Storage Accelerator feature for all pools that are on the shared ESXi hosts. Having
inconsistent settings in multiple pods can cause instability of the virtual machines on the shared ESXi hosts.
Prerequisites
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Verify that your vCenter Server and ESXi hosts are version 5.0 or later.
In an ESXi cluster, verify that all the hosts are version 5.0 or later.
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Verify that the vCenter Server user was assigned the Host > Configuration > Advanced settings
privilege in vCenter Server. See the topics in the View Installation documentation that describe View and
View Composer privileges required for the vCenter Server user.
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Verify that View Storage Accelerator is enabled in vCenter Server. See the View Administration
document.
Setting Up Desktop and Application Pools in View
250 VMware, Inc.