Why I Still Rely on Bare Metal Control
Virtualization is undoubtedly powerful, but it relies on a foundation that must be rock solid. My approach involves understanding the hardware layer deeply. I recently reconfigured a hardware RAID controller to JBOD mode to allow direct disk pass-through for my Proxmox VE setup. This isn’t just a technical preference; it is a decision to prioritize transparency and control. Using an LSI MegaRaid SAS 9270CV-8i controller, I ensure that my hypervisor has total authority over the storage.
There is no substitute for knowing exactly how your data hits the physical storage media. When you rely solely on abstraction layers, you risk losing visibility into potential hardware failures or latency issues. By maintaining bare metal control, I can troubleshoot at the BIOS and controller level, which is a capability that is often lost in fully abstracted cloud environments. This methodology is carried over to my professional work; I believe that infrastructure leads should understand the full stack, from the physical SAS controller up to the virtualized application layer. This knowledge enables me to build systems that are not only high-performing but also highly resilient to failure, as I am not relying on proprietary “black box” RAID configurations to protect my data.