This post explains you the major difference between VMFS 3 and VMFS 5. VMFS 5 is available as part of vSphere 5. VMFS 5 is introduced with lot of performance enhancements. Newly installed ESXi 5 will be formatted with VMFS 5 version but if you have upgraded the ESX 4 or ESX 4.1 to ESXi 5, then datastore version will be VMFS 3 only. You will able to upgrade the VMFS 3 to VMFS 5 via vSphere client once ESXi upgrade is Complete. This posts tells you some major differences between VMFS 3 and VMFS 5
|
Capability
|
VMFS 3
|
VMFS 5
|
|
Maximum single Extend size
|
2 TB less 512 bytes
|
64 TB
|
|
Partition Style
|
MBR (Master Boot Record) style
|
GPT (GUID Partition Table)
|
|
Available Block Size
|
1 MB/2MB/4MB/8MB
|
only 1 MB
|
|
Maximum size of RDM in
Virtual Compatibiltiy |
2 TB less 512 bytes
|
2 TB less 512 bytes
|
|
Maximum size of RDM in
Phsical Compatibiltiy |
2 TB less 512 bytes
|
64 TB
|
|
Supported Hosts versions
|
ESX/ESX 3.X, 4.X & 5.x
|
Only ESXi 5 is supported
|
|
Spanned Volume size
|
64 TB (32 extends with max
size of extent is 2 TB) |
64 TB (32 extends with
any size combination) |
|
Upgrade path
|
VMFS 3 to VMFS 5
|
Latest Version. NO upgarde
available yet. |
|
File Limit
|
30,000
|
100,000
|
|
Sub-Block size
|
64 KB
|
8 KB
|
I hope this post will be informative for you. Be social and share this post in social medias.