The Dell PowerEdge R815 is my go-to 2U server for VMware virtualization hosts. Here’s why.
- Excellent airflow and serviceability. Between the redundant fans, the power supply layout, and the way the RAM is arranged, the whole chassis is laid out well and easy to work on.
- No spinning disks required. I order them with dual SD cards for ESXi and nothing else, and they’re good to go.
- Dual power supplies come standard.
- Expansion slots for extra network connectivity.
- Room to grow. You can order a “half RAM, half processor” configuration and expand later.
- AMD Opteron processors that, in my opinion, offer the best performance per watt on the market.
Running into iSCSI latency with the onboard Broadcom NICs? See my Broadcom driver fix for the R815.