You can install vCenter Server and View Composer on the same virtual machine or on separate servers. These servers require much more memory and processing power than a desktop virtual machine.
VMware tested having View Composer create and provision 2,000 desktops per pool using vSphere 5.1 or later. VMware also tested having View Composer perform a recompose operation on 2,000 desktops at a time. For these tests, vCenter Server and View Composer were installed on separate virtual machines.
Desktop pool size is limited by the following factors:
- Each desktop pool can contain only one vSphere cluster.
- With some setups, clusters can contain up to 32 hosts. With other setups, clusters are limited to 8 hosts. For more information, see vSphere Clusters.
- Each CPU core has compute capacity for 8 to 10 virtual desktops.
- The number of IP addresses available for the subnet limits the number of desktops in the pool. For example, if your network is set up so that the subnet for the pool contains only 256 usable IP addresses, the pool size is limited to 256 desktops. You can, however, configure multiple network labels to greatly expand the number of IP addresses assigned to virtual machines in a pool.
Although you can install vCenter Server and View Composer on a physical machine, this example uses separate virtual machines with the specifications listed in the following tables. The ESXi host for these virtual machines can be part of a VMware HA cluster to guard against physical server failures.
This example assumes that you are using Horizon 7 with vSphere 5.1 or later and vCenter Server 5.1 or later.
| Item | Example for a vCenter Server That Manages 10,000 Desktops | Example for a vCenter Server That Manages 2,000 Desktops |
|---|---|---|
| Operating system | 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise | 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise |
| RAM | 48GB | 10-24GB, depending on vSphere version |
| Virtual CPU | 16 | 2 -8, depending on vSphere version |
| System disk capacity | 180GB | 40GB |
| Virtual SCSI adapter type | LSI Logic SAS (the default for Windows Server 2008) | LSI Logic SAS (the default for Windows Server 2008) |
| Virtual network adapter | E1000 (the default) | VMXNET 3 (though E1000, the default, is fine too) |
| Maximum concurrent vCenter provisioning operations | 20 | 20 |
| Maximum concurrent power operations | 50 | 50 |
| Item | Example for a View Composer That Manages 10,000 Desktops | Example for a View Composer That Manages 2,000 Desktops |
|---|---|---|
| Operating system | 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise | 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise |
| RAM | 10GB or more , depending on vSphere version | 4-10GB, depending on vSphere version |
| Virtual CPU | 4 or more , depending on vSphere version | 2 -4, depending on vSphere version |
| System disk capacity | 50GB | 40GB |
| Virtual SCSI adapter type | LSI Logic SAS (the default for Windows Server 2008) | LSI Logic SAS (the default for Windows Server 2008) |
| Virtual network adapter | VMXNET 3 | VMXNET 3 |
| Maximum View Composer pool size | 2,000 desktops | 1,000 desktops |
| Maximum concurrent View Composer maintenance operations | 12 | 12 |
| Maximum concurrent View Composer provisioning operations | 8 | 8 |
