Two native iSCSI LUNs in a 2012 storage pool

I have a Windows Server 2012 storage pool connected to a single SAN VIA iSCSI. I'd like to add a second SAN and present the virtual disks as part of the same pool to extend my total storage. Is this possible?

Hi,
I do not have the environment to test if add LUNs from different SAN will work or not but personally I believe it will work as SAN (LUN) is supported to be added into a storage pool.
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Similar Messages

Adding lun to an existing storage pool

i have problems to add a lun to an existing storage pool.
The storage pool is data only type.
The log file /var/run/xsancvupdatefsxsan.log indicates:
^MMerging bitmap data ( 99%)99.00
^MMerging bitmap data (100%)
Bitmap fragmentation: 1900004 chunks (0%)
Bitmap fragmentation threshold exceeded. Aborting.
Invalid argument
Fatal: Failed to expand stripe group
Check configuration and try again
After run the defrag command to some folders the log indicates:
Merging bitmap data (100%)
Bitmap fragmentation: 1898528 chunks (0%)
Bitmap fragmentation threshold exceeded. Aborting.
Invalid argument
Fatal: Failed to expand stripe group
Check configuration and try again
Do i need to run a complete defrag ?
Apple documentation indicates we need to delete the data before add the new LUN because there´s an issue. (is a very big issue!!!).
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303571
Thanks for any help.
xsan 1.4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

hi william, thanks for your answer.
Right now my storage is %68 used.
Do you think, if i have < 60% used, the storage pool expansion will work?
I prefer to add a lun to a storage pool instead to create a new storage pool, because adding a lun add bandwith too.
thanks for any advice.
CCL

2 luns in the metadata storage pool

Hi,
I am currently using Xsan ( for redundancy ) with a volume that requires high I/O. However, I am receiving poor performance at times, with the read latency mainly. I think this is caused by the metadata storage pool (RAID 1 on its own controller) as I can see the RAID controller running at maximum most of the time.
Would having RAID 0+1 with 4 drives or two luns in the metadata data pool with each on its own controller improve performance or would it be decremental to the SAN???
Any advice would be appreciated
Thanks
Gary

Hi,
I am aware that one dedicated metadata lun with RAID 1 is listed as the optimal configuration and is more than adequate for most. However, I am using the volume for very large I/O with millions of file requests each day for which Xsan wasn't originally designed to do. I was aware of this at the time, but with the original intended I/O levels not really a problem. Also, as far as I can tell all hardware is acting normally with optimal configuration. I have experimented with some different settings with no major improvement.
I have read the mentioned guide before and it is a very useful document.
I'm not convinced that it is a configuration problem anywhere, but rather a limitation of the topology. I've got another 2 drives in now for a test to see what happens.
Thanks for your advice.
Gary

System Center 2012R2 Storage Pool Deduplication?

I am trying to find out if it is possible to deduplicate data on a System Center 2012R2 Storage Pool on Server 2012R2. I am aware that DPM will back up deduplicated data in a deduplicated state, but this is about deduplicating data backed
up from multiple sources. Searching shows me that deduplicating System Center 2012 Storage Pools on Server 2012 was not supported, but the threads I found that showed this either had screenshots or quotes of the information instead of links to the documentation.
Is it possible/supported to deduplicate data within a System Center 2012R2 Storage Pool on Server 2012R2?

Hi,
Yes, if you virtualize your DPM server, it is possible to enable deduplication of DPM storage pool disks.
Please see the following white paper:
Deduplicating DPM storage
We are working on a better solution long term.
Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. Regards, Mike J. [MSFT]
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Windows Server 2012 Storage Spaces Simple RAID 0 VERY SLOW reads, but fast writes with LSI 9207-8e SAS JBOD HBA Controller

Has anyone else seen Windows Server 2012 Storage Spaces with a Simple RAID 0 (also happens with Mirrored RAID 1 and Parity RAID 5) virtual disk exhibiting extremely slow read speed of 5Mb/sec, yet write performance is normal at 650Mb/sec in RAID 0?
Windows Server 2012 Standard
Intel i7 CPU and Motherboard
LSI 9207-8e 6Gb SAS JBOD Controller with latest firmware/BIOS and Windows driver.
(4) Hitachi 4TB 6Gb SATA Enterprise Hard Disk Drives HUS724040ALE640
(4) Hitachi 4TB 6Gb SATA Desktop Hard Disk Drives HDS724040ALE640
Hitachi drives are directly connected to LSI 9207-8e using a 2-meter SAS SFF-8088 to eSATA cable to six-inch eSATA/SATA adapter.
The Enterprise drives are on LSI's compatibility list. The Desktop drives are not, but regardless, both drive models are affected by the problem.
Interestingly, this entire configuration but with two SIIG eSATA 2-Port adapters instead of the LSI 9207-8e, works perfectly with both reads and writes at 670Mb/sec.
I thought SAS was going to be a sure bet for expanding beyond the capacity of port limited eSATA adapters, but after a week of frustration and spending over $5,000.00 on drives, controllers and cabling, it's time to ask for help!
Any similar experiences or solutions?

Has anyone else seen Windows Server 2012 Storage Spaces with a Simple RAID 0 (also happens with Mirrored RAID 1 and Parity RAID 5) virtual disk exhibiting extremely slow read speed of 5Mb/sec, yet write performance is normal at 650Mb/sec in RAID 0?
Windows Server 2012 Standard
Intel i7 CPU and Motherboard
LSI 9207-8e 6Gb SAS JBOD Controller with latest firmware/BIOS and Windows driver.
(4) Hitachi 4TB 6Gb SATA Enterprise Hard Disk Drives HUS724040ALE640
(4) Hitachi 4TB 6Gb SATA Desktop Hard Disk Drives HDS724040ALE640
Hitachi drives are directly connected to LSI 9207-8e using a 2-meter SAS SFF-8088 to eSATA cable to six-inch eSATA/SATA adapter.
The Enterprise drives are on LSI's compatibility list. The Desktop drives are not, but regardless, both drive models are affected by the problem.
Interestingly, this entire configuration but with two SIIG eSATA 2-Port adapters instead of the LSI 9207-8e, works perfectly with both reads and writes at 670Mb/sec.
I thought SAS was going to be a sure bet for expanding beyond the capacity of port limited eSATA adapters, but after a week of frustration and spending over $5,000.00 on drives, controllers and cabling, it's time to ask for help!
Any similar experiences or solutions?
1) Yes, being slow either on reads or on writes is a quite common situation for storage spaces. See references (with some of the solutions I hope):
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverfiles/thread/a58f8fce-de45-4032-a3ef-f825ee39b96e/
http://blogs.technet.com/b/askpfeplat/archive/2012/10/10/windows-server-2012-storage-spaces-is-it-for-you-could-be.aspx
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserver8gen/thread/64aff15f-2e34-40c6-a873-2e0da5a355d2/
and this one is my favorite putting a lot of light on the issue:
http://helgeklein.com/blog/2012/03/windows-8-storage-spaces-bugs-and-design-flaws/
2) Issues with SATA-to-SAS hardware is also very common. See:
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverClustering/thread/5d4f68b7-5fc4-4a3c-8232-a2a68bf3e6d2
StarWind iSCSI SAN & NAS

Migrating SQL data from iSCSI LUNs on one NetApp to another

Hi....
I have a clustered pair of SQL 2012 servers which are using the Microsoft iSCSI initiator service to attach to some LUNs on a NetApp storage system. I am trying to migrate the data on these LUNs to a different NetApp system and am not 100% sure how
I should do this. I have dedicated LUNs for:
Database data
Logs
TempDB data
TempDB logs
Quorum
Backup
Each LUN is mapped to a drive.
Does anyone know the best way to go about this? I was going to detach all clients from the database, stop cluster services on the standby node, copy the data from active node to the standby node on the new LUNs with the same drive mappings, then stop
all services on the active node, followed by turning on services on the standby making it the active.
I have a feeling this isn't going to work as I expect so I figure I would ask the question.

Hi,
I recommend you check out the following articles:
WINDOWS 2008 / 2008 R2 SAN Migration
http://blogs.technet.com/b/hugofe/archive/2012/07/04/windows-2008-2008-r2-san-migration.aspx
Swapping a new larger LUN for an existing LUN
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/cfeac1ce-760f-4a92-a20c-02e4181b876b/swapping-a-new-larger-lun-for-an-existing-lun
Best Regards,
Tracy
Tracy Cai
TechNet Community Support

Can not attach older iSCSI lun to repository

I am a current Virtual Iron user and have set up OVM to replace my aging system. I have everything set up on some new hardware and up to a point where I want to set up some VMs.
I have an older VM under Virtual Iron I am no longer using, so I thought this would be a good test subject.
I assigned both my OVM servers to the volume in my iSCSI san.
The SAN and volume show correctly within the storage tab.
I have rescanned for physical disks on each server and found the volume.
I can not create a VM just using the physical disk....I wants me to use a repository...
Ok, so I tried to create a repository using the existing volume that contains my server....no go...get this error
(10/16/2012 12:38:54:518 PM)
OVMAPI_B000E Storage plugin command [storage_plugin_createFileSystem] failed for storage server [0004fb0000090000df4ea0c58186307e] failed with [com.oracle.ovm.mgr.api.exception.FailedOperationException: OVMAPI_4010E Attempt to send command: dispatch to server: OVMS1 failed. OVMAPI_4004E Server Failed Command: dispatch https://?uname?:[email protected]:8899/api/2 storage_plugin_createFileSystem oracle.ocfs2.OCFS2.OCFS2Plugin 0004fb00000500003beb40ffab937285 /dev/mapper/36000eb346b4e2d99000000000000012e 0, Status: OSCPlugin.InvalidValueEx:'The backing device /dev/mapper/36000eb346b4e2d99000000000000012e is not allowed to contain partitions'
Tue Oct 16 12:38:54 CDT 2012
Tue Oct 16 12:38:54 CDT 2012] OVMAPI_4010E Attempt to send command: dispatch to server: OVMS1 failed. OVMAPI_4004E Server Failed Command: dispatch https://?uname?:[email protected]:8899/api/2 storage_plugin_createFileSystem oracle.ocfs2.OCFS2.OCFS2Plugin 0004fb00000500003beb40ffab937285 /dev/mapper/36000eb346b4e2d99000000000000012e 0, Status: org.apache.xmlrpc.XmlRpcException: OSCPlugin.InvalidValueEx:'The backing device /dev/mapper/36000eb346b4e2d99000000000000012e is not allowed to contain partitions'
Tue Oct 16 12:38:54 CDT 2012
Tue Oct 16 12:38:54 CDT 2012
Tue Oct 16 12:38:54 CDT 2012
Looks like it will not use the volume because something is on it.
In Virtual Iron, I could use a virtual storage (repository), local disks, or iSCSI luns for my VMs.
So how am I to use my older server within OVM?

Ok. Found that someone else was having similar problems....
Oracle VM Manager 3.1.1: Discovering SAN Servers
My solution was to scrap the whole thing....and start over with the new beta 3.2.1. (build 258) This has given me the ability to see all my SANs now.
Edited by: Looney128 on Nov 13, 2012 8:32 AM

Windows 2012 storage server and tier with external SSD disks

Hi
My query is in case I have one SAN storage with SSD and FC disks connected to Windows 2012 storage server, will Windows be able to manage Tier between two types of disks if the volumes are properly assigned and formated?
Regards

Hi
My query is in case I have one SAN storage with SSD and FC disks connected to Windows 2012 storage server, will Windows be able to manage Tier between two types of disks if the volumes are properly assigned and formated?
Regards
Short answer: No, not automatically. Long answer: Yes, it can be done but with some tricks. First you'll have to make your SAN export LUs built from flash and from spindles. At least one of each (see URL below). Then you'll have to build storage spaces (even
clustered but that's not officially supported for non-SAS disks) from them.
See:
Configure Tiering with Windows Server 2012 R2
http://blogs.technet.com/b/askpfeplat/archive/2013/10/21/storage-spaces-how-to-configure-storage-tiers-with-windows-server-2012-r2.aspx
Both LUs would have non-SSD type reported so you'll have manually assign types with PowerShell what's flash and what's spindle.
"Notice that the SSD devices were detected as SSD media. However, in this case the physical drives show as unknown.
If yours are not detected like in this example, they should be set correctly which can be done using PowerShell. "
Hope this helped :)
StarWind VSAN [Virtual SAN] clusters Hyper-V without SAS, Fibre Channel, SMB 3.0 or iSCSI, uses Ethernet to mirror internally mounted SATA disks between hosts.

DPM Storage Pool on Windows Server 2012R2 iSCSI target Storage Spaces - supported?

Hi,
for migration purpose we need more space for one of our DPM 2012R2 Servers.
And we cannot buy more space for our NetAPPs..
So our idea was to use an Windows Server 2012R2 as an iSCSI target and use Storage Spaces.
I remember something that using an iSCSI target on Windows 2008 was not supported.
Is this configuration supported when usinf DPM 2012R2 on Win 2012R2 and the target is Win2012R2 aswell?
Thanks in advance
regards
/bkpfast
My postings are provided "AS IS" with no warranties and confer no rights

Hi,
This talks about
Virtual DPM servers, but the same is true for Physical DPM servers when it comes to using .VHD(x) files for DPM storage pool.
Virtual DPM installations do not support the following:
Windows 2012 Storage Spaces.
Virtual hard drives built on top of storage spaces.
Local or remote hosting of VHDX files on Windows 2012 storage spaces.
Enabling Disk Dedupe on volumes hosting virtual hard drives.
Using synthetic FC to connect to tape drives.
Windows 2012 iSCSI targets (which use virtual hard drives) as a DPM storage pool.
NTFS compression for volumes hosting VHD files used in the DPM storage pool.
Bitlocker on volumes hosting VHD files used for the storage pool.
A native 4K sector size of physical disks for VHDX files in the DPM storage pool.
Virtual hard drives hosted on Windows 2008 servers.
Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread. Regards, Mike J. [MSFT]
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Add iSCSI LUN to Multiple Hyper-V Cluster Hosts?

Is there a way to connect multiple Hyper-V hosts to a CSV LUN without manually logging into each and opening the iSCSI Initiator GUI?

Is there a way to connect multiple Hyper-V hosts to a CSV LUN without manually logging into each and opening the iSCSI Initiator GUI?
Here's a good step-by-step guide on how to do everything you want using just PowerShell. Please see:
Configuring iSCSI storage for a Hyper-V Cluster
http://www.hypervrockstar.com/qs-buildingahypervcluster_part3/
This part is should be of a particular interest of yours. See:
Connect Nodes to iSCSI Target
Once the target is created and configured, we need to attach the iSCSI initiator in each node to the storage. We will use MPIO to
ensure best performance and availability of storage. When we enable the MS
DSM to claim all iSCSI LUNs we must reboot the node for the setting to take affect. MPIO is utilized by creating a persistent connection to the target for each data NIC on the target server and from all iSCSI initiator NICs on our hyper-v
server. Because our hyper-v servers are using converged networking, we only have 1 iSCSI NIC. In our example resiliency is provided by the LBFO team we created in the last video.
PowerShell Commands
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Set-Service -Name
msiscsi -StartupType Automatic
Start-Service msiscsi
#reboot requres after claim
Enable-MSDSMAutomaticClaim -BusType
iSCSI
Set-MSDSMGlobalDefaultLoadBalancePolicy
-Policy RR
New-IscsiTargetPortal –TargetPortalAddress 192.168.1.107
$target = Get-IscsiTarget
-NodeAddress *HyperVCluster*
$target| Connect-IscsiTarget
-IsPersistent $true -IsMultipathEnabled
$true -InitiatorPortalAddress
192.168.1.21 -TargetPortalAddress 10.0.1.10
$target| Connect-IscsiTarget-IsPersistent$true-IsMultipathEnabled$
You'll find a reference to "Connect-IscsiTarget" PowerShell cmdlet here:
Connect-IscsiTarget
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh826098.aspx
Set of samples on how to control MSFT iSCSI initiator with PowerShell could be found here:
Managing iSCSI Initiator with PowerShell
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/san/archive/2012/07/31/managing-iscsi-initiator-connections-with-windows-powershell-on-windows-server-2012.aspx
Good luck and happy clustering :)
StarWind Virtual SAN clusters Hyper-V without SAS, Fibre Channel, SMB 3.0 or iSCSI, uses Ethernet to mirror internally mounted SATA disks between hosts.

After delete iSCSI LUN vacant space does not become available

px12-400r, one pool on RAID10 (5,42TB).
Pool divided into 4 iSCSI LUN (2TB+2TB+1TB+0,42TB).
After deleteting one of them (on 2TB), this vacant space in tab "System Status" (over Web Interface) shown in the diagram as the free and "Amount of available space" on Status Bar 2TB (on Device Home Page over Web Interface),
but in tab "Disk Management" shows "Allocated/Available" - "5,42TB/0B" , and new volume or iSCSI LUN can not be added ("In any storage pool does not have enough space to add an iSCSI drive"
Storage in AD. Deleting iSCSI LUN over Web Interface under AD user with storage admin rights.
Rebooting storage did not help. What to do? How to return control of this free disk space?

Hello gusev67
To be certain that the iSCSI LUN was actually delete, please try this alternate method to check if the LUN is present and if so, deleted.
Go to Drive Management and click on the "volumes" section of your storage pool
Navigate to the iSCSI LUN that should have been deleted/removed
If it is present there, please click on the iSCSI LUN name to show the iSCSI information overview for the LUN, there click on the "delete" option.
If that does not seem to resolve the issue I recommend contacting LenovoEMC support regarding the problem.
LenovoEMC Contact Information is region specific. Please select the correct link then access the Contact Us at the top right:
US and Canada: https://lenovo-na-en.custhelp.com/
Latin America and Mexico: https://lenovo-la-es.custhelp.com/
EU: https://lenovo-eu-en.custhelp.com/
India/Asia Pacific: https://lenovo-ap-en.custhelp.com/
http://support.lenovoemc.com/

Install OVM server 3.2.1 on iSCSI LUN

Hello friends,
I have a Cisco Blade and would like to boot OVM server from an iSCSI lun. I create a LUN from a SAN and presented the lun to the blade. When the server boots up, it sees the iSCSI lun just fine but when I tried to install OVM server 3.2.1, it did not detect that LUN. I tried to install Oracle Linux 6.3 and it sees the LUN ok. Is there a way to make OVM server to see that LUN.
thanks,
TD

I have done to many oel and ovs install lately such that they are blurring together...
On the OVM 3.2.1 install watch closely for a place to add support for non local storage. I remember seeing a small prompt in some of the installs but it may have been from some of the OEL installs (I have also been doing OEL 4, 5, & 6) & not OVM.
Sorry I can't remember right now. If I get a moment and try to run the install process I will and report back if no one else does.

Using iscsi luns as vdiskserverdevices

Hi
I am new to LDoms and was wondering if anyone has any experience of using iscsi luns (presented by zfs volumes on an X4500) as vdiskserverdevices . In my case the iscsi luns were presented to the service domain (in this case the control domain) and were correctly visible and accessible from it. However when presented as vdisks to the guest domains, for use as the root disk, the guest domains could not access/see the disks. When the guest domain was booted for a jumpstart install one of the first messages was that it couldn't access the vdisks and this was confirmed during the install process when a boot disk couldn't be found. AFAIK solaris can't boot of iscsi luns (without iscsi HBA's) but I figured that hiding the iscsi lun behind the vdiskserver would work -but no such luck. Any advice on whether this is possible would be most welcome.
As an unwanted work-around I created a couple of large files (aprox 420 Gb and 920Gb) and presented these instead as the vdsdevs. This time the smaller 420Gb couldn't be seen at all by the guest domain while the larger file showed up as a SUN 920Gb type disk though while partitioning it, it only showed about 100Gb as the disk size. Any pointers as to what I'm doing wrong here is also most welcome.
My hardware consists of 2* T5220 running Sol10 08/07 with latest recommended patches and firmware and an X4500 which is being used to provide all (root and data) storage for the guest domains.
Thanks
Saurav

Hi there,
I am setting up a platform when the guest domains are installed into iSCSI LUNS and it is working fine.
I am using LUN's expported from a NetApp rather than using ZFS but that shouldn't matter. They appear like this on my test platform:
root@solarisvh # iscsiadm list target -S
Target: iqn.1992-08.com.netapp:sn.********
        Alias: -
        TPGT: 2000
        ISID: 4000002a0000
        Connections: 1
        LUN: 0
             Vendor: NETAPP
             Product: LUN
             OS Device Name: /dev/rdsk/c4t0d0s2And I can add it into a guest domain by running:
ldm add-vdsdev /dev/rdsk/c4t0d0s2 examplevol1@primary-vds0I found that I had to pop in an label the disk (using format) on the first use for it to be picked up but after that it worked fine and I could boot up and install an OS into the LUN.
Josh

Oracle VM 3.1.1: Using iSCSI LUN's as Device-Backed Virtual Machine Disks?

Will Oracle VM Manager 3.1.1 support the use of iSCSI LUN's as device-backed virtual machine disks? i.e., Can iSCSI LUN's be treated like directly-attached storage (DAS) and used as virtual machine disks?
Eric Pretorious
Truckee, CA

user12273962 wrote:
I don't personally use ISCSI. BUT, I don't see why you can't create physical pass through attachments to virtual guests using ISCSI LUNS. It is no different than FC or direct attach storage. Worst case scenerio... you can create a repo on the ISCSI LUN and then create virtual disks.
Oracle VM Getting Started Guide for Release 3.1.1Chapter 7. Create a Storage Repository
A storage repository is where Oracle VM resources may reside... Resources include virtual machines, templates for virtual machine creation, virtual machine assemblies, ISO files (DVD image files), shared virtual disks, and so on. This would have the effect of using file-backed virtual machine disks but at least they'd be centrally-located on shared storage (and, therefore, the virtual machine could run as an HA guest)
budachst wrote:
I have kicked this idea around as well, but I decided do it slightly different, by providing the storage repo via multipathed iSCSI and use iSCSI within my guests if needed for better speed or lower disk latency.
If you want to use iSCSI as the virtual devices for your guests in a clustered server pool, you'd have to grant access to all of your iSCSI targets to any VM server and I was not feeling comfortable with that. I rather grant only the guest directly access to "its" iSCSI target. So I will keep all of my guests system images on the clustered server pool - and additionally also the virtual disks that don't need a high performance and have the really heavy-duty vdisks as separate iSCSI targets.That seems logical, Budy:
<ul>
<li>Use a multipathed iSCSI repository for hosting the virtual machine's disk image, and then;
<li>Utilize iSCSI LUN's for "more performant" parts of the guest's file system (e.g., /var).
</ul>
I'm still puzzled about that image, though. +i.e., the fourth image from the bottom of Chapter 7.7, "Creating a Virtual Machine" ("To add a physical disk:...") where it's clear that the exising "physical" disks are actually iSCSI LUN's that are attached to the OVM server.+
I suppose that I'll have to configure some iSCSI LUN's and try it out to be certain. Just another tool that I don't have +but will need to add to my toolbox+.

WINDOWS 2012 STORAGE SERVER R2

I am a Microsoft Partner that is in search of Windows Storage Server R2. I have multiple buyers for the product already and would like to fill orders of this product. I have been having difficulty finding distribution for the product from Synnex, ASI Corp,
MA Labs, Tech Data etc.
Firstly, Where can I purchase Windows 2012 Storage Server R2?
Secondly, How can I become an authorized reseller of this product?
Any assistance would be appreciated. Please email me at:
[email protected] . Thank you

I am a Microsoft Partner that is in search of Windows Storage Server R2. I have multiple buyers for the product already and would like to fill orders of this product. I have been having difficulty finding distribution for the product from Synnex, ASI Corp,
MA Labs, Tech Data etc.
Firstly, Where can I purchase Windows 2012 Storage Server R2?
Secondly, How can I become an authorized reseller of this product?
Any assistance would be appreciated. Please email me at:
[email protected] . Thank you
I would not do it... I mean hunting for Storage Server is pointless. For a reason: built-in restrictions make it unusable for anything else except storage management (what it was initially designed for).
(there are other important restrictions like being not able to be an Active Directory controller but they are irrelevant in the context of this topic)
Running more then 2 VMs is not supported. Having full-blown x64 server doing only storage and spending 1% of CPU time for that is... a bit questionable investment. System would be insanely resource over provisioned. Very bad ROI. See:
Storage Server Overview
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj643303.aspx
Product description
A computer that runs Windows Storage Server is referred to as a storage appliance. Windows Storage Server is based on the Windows Server operating system,
and it is specifically optimized for use with network-attached storage devices. Windows Storage Server offers you a platform to build storage appliances that are customized for your hardware.
Role/Feature
Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 Workgroup
Windows Storage Server 2012 Workgroup
Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 Standard
Windows Storage Server 2012 Standard
Virtualization (Hyper-V® host or guest support)
No
Yes, 2 VMS
StarWind VSAN [Virtual SAN] clusters Hyper-V without SAS, Fibre Channel, SMB 3.0 or iSCSI, uses Ethernet to mirror internally mounted SATA disks between hosts.

Two native iSCSI LUNs in a 2012 storage pool

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