6.7

Create Virtual Machines with RDMs
When you give your virtual machine direct access to a raw SAN LUN, you create an RDM disk that
resides on a VMFS datastore and points to the LUN. You can create the RDM as an initial disk for a new
virtual machine or add it to an existing virtual machine. When creating the RDM, you specify the LUN to
be mapped and the datastore on which to put the RDM.
Although the RDM disk file has the same.vmdk extension as a regular virtual disk file, the RDM contains
only mapping information. The actual virtual disk data is stored directly on the LUN.
This procedure assumes that you are creating a new virtual machine. For information, see the vSphere
Virtual Machine Administration documentation.
Procedure
1 Create a virtual machine.
a Right-click any inventory object that is a valid parent object of a virtual machine, such as a data
center, folder, cluster, resource pool, or host, and select New Virtual Machine.
b Select Create a new virtual machine and click Next.
c Follow the steps required to create a virtual machine.
2 On the Customize Hardware page, click the Virtual Hardware tab.
3 (Optional) To delete the default virtual hard disk that the system created for your virtual machine,
move your cursor over the disk and click the Remove icon.
4 Add an RDM disk.
a Click Add New Devices and select RDM Disk from the list.
b From the list of LUNs, select a target raw LUN and click OK.
The system creates an RDM disk that maps your virtual machine to the target LUN. The RDM
disk is shown on the list of virtual devices as a new hard disk.
5 Configure the RDM disk.
a Click the New Hard Disk triangle to expand the properties for the RDM disk.
b Select a location for the RDM.
You can place the RDM on the same datastore where your virtual machine configuration files
reside, or select a different datastore.
Note To use vMotion for virtual machines with enabled NPIV, make sure that the RDM files and
the virtual machine files are located on the same datastore. You cannot perform Storage vMotion
when NPIV is enabled.
vSphere Storage
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