Tuning Management Pack for VMware

Monitor

Default Threshold(s)

Tuning

Veeam VMware: Datastore Provisioning Analysis

diskPressure > 125 (warning)

This monitor tracks disk pressure for datastores, which is storage over-allocation expressed as a percentage. Over-allocation (thin provisioning) is not directly a performance problem, so this monitor can be viewed as tracking IT policy for the storage environment.

If thin provisioning is used in your environment with values greater than 125% overcommit, then you should override the threshold for this monitor.

Veeam VMware: vSphere Cluster Memory Overcommit Analysis /

Veeam VMware: vSphere Host Memory Overcommit Analysis

Memory Pressure > 150 (warning)

These monitors track Memory Pressure for clusters and hosts, which is memory overcommit expressed as a percentage. This metric factors in vSphere features such as TPS (transparent page-sharing) so it does indicate when true memory overcommit is occurring.

Memory overcommit does not in general indicate a performance problem (although it does place more stress on vSphere memory management techniques), so this monitor can be viewed as tracking IT policy for the memory allocation in vSphere.

If memory overcommit is used in your environment with values greater than 150%, then you should override the threshold for these monitors.

Veeam VMware: vSphere Cluster CPU Overcommit Analysis /

Veeam VMware: vSphere Host CPU Overcommit Analysis

CPU Pressure > 150 (warning)

These monitors track CPU Pressure for clusters and hosts, which is CPU over-commit expressed as a percentage. This metric is based on the ratio of running virtual machine vCPUs versus host physical CPU cores.

A default of 10 vCPU per host core is used to calculate this ratio as a percentage. This default of 10 sits between the industry standard of 4–8, and the vSphere maximum of 25. The default can be modified in the Veeam Extensions UI, which will affect the calculation of cpuPressure metric in the Collector.

CPU overcommit does not in general indicate a performance problem although it does place more stress on the vSphere host CPU scheduler. The real world achievable ratio is very dependent on the workloads running in VMs. For example VDI environments may achieve a much higher ratio and therefore a much higher cpuPressure rating for the host or cluster.

If CPU overcommit is used in your environment with values greater than 150%, then you should override the threshold for these monitors.

Veeam VMware: Datastore Unknown Files Analysis

unknownFilesGB > 50, warning

This monitor tracks the Unknown Files on a vSphere datastore – that is, files which are unknown to vCenter or not managed by vCenter. These could be orphaned VM disks or snapshots, or manually uploaded files such as ISOs.

If your environment contains datastores which have the specific purpose of holding non-vCenter managed files, such as ISO storage, it is recommended to override the threshold for this monitor.

Virtual Machine Disk Space Analysis

freeMB < 100

This monitor tracks free disk space in MB on partitions inside virtual machines. (Note that VMware Tools must be installed in the virtualized OS to enable Veeam MP for VMware to collect this data agentlessly)

This is a multi-instance monitor which will track all configured OS partitions even though it targets the single VM object.

Included and excluded disk partitions by name are available as overrides for the monitor. For example, by default the partition /boot is excluded as in most Linux machines this has less than 100MB free, so would immediately generate an alert as soon as monitoring commenced.

Depending on the usage of VMs and specific disk partitions in your environment you may wish to override the default threshold.

Virtual Machine Snapshot Usage Analysis

snapshotAge > 48 (hours)

snapshotsSize > 2048 (MB)

This monitor tracks snapshot usage for virtual machines. Both age (of the oldest snapshot) and size (total for all snapshots) are monitored.

In general snapshots are not used for production environments except on a strictly controlled or temporary basis (for example by image-based backup solutions). However snapshots may be extensively used longer-term in development, test or QA environments. Depending on the systems you are monitoring, you may wish to override the default thresholds on this monitor.