VMware memory management seems to be a tricky balancing act. With cluster RAM, Resource Pools, VMware's management techniques (TPS, ballooning, host swapping), in-guest RAM utilization, swapping, reservations, shares and limits, there are a lot of variables. I'm in a situation where clients are using dedicated vSphere cluster resources. However, they are configuring the virtual machines as though they were on physical hardware. In turn, this means a standard VM build may have 4 vCPUs and 16GB or more of RAM. I come from the school of starting small (1 vCPU, minimal RAM), checking real-world use and adjusting up as necessary. Unfortunately, many vendor requirements and people unfamiliar with virtualization request more resources than necessary... I'm interested in quantifying the impact of this decision. Some examples from a "problem" cluster. Resource pool summary - Looks almost 4:1 overcommitted. Note the high amount of ballooned RAM. Resource allocation - The W...