I normally run my MSSQL servers on dedicated servers, but we've taken on a client who is running their SQL Server inside a VMWare ESXi 4 host, and quite frankly it's running like crap.
We have identified that it is not the database itself that is the issue. We deployed the same database onto a dedicated server with lower specs than the VMWare guest and it ran at least 5x faster.
The server is:
Dual Quad Core Xeon 2Ghz (I don't know the exact model)
24Gb RAM
4x 300Gb SAS (RAID 10)
ESXi 4
The host is:
4x vCPUs
3Gb RAM
80Gb disk space
Server 2008 Standard
SQL Server 2008 Workgroup
The other VM's on the host are very low traffic. A 2nd DC (almost unused), a low-traffic web server and a low-volume terminal server (~5 users at any given time) and a few other misc guests.
I read an article a long time ago about setting a whole bunch of Paging settings in Windows and the SQL server to optimise it, but I can't find it any more :(
Are there any tips or tricks anyone can offer to increase the SQL performance?