VxRail VI WLD can be either Virtual Infrastructure (VI) WLDs, Horizon domains, or PKS WLDs.

VI WLD

The VI WLD can consist of one or more VxRail clusters. The VxRail cluster is the building block for the VxRail VI WLD. The first cluster of each VI WLD must have four hosts, but subsequent clusters can start with three hosts. The VI WLD can be either an NSX-V based WLD or an NSX-T based WLD. This can be selected when adding the first cluster to the WLD. The vCenter and NSX-V or NSX-T Manager for each VI WLD are deployed into the Mgmt WLD. For an NSX-V based VI WLD the controllers are deployed to the first cluster in the VI WLD added by the SDDC Manager. Each new VI WLD requires an NSX-V Manager to be deployed in the Mgmt WLD and the three controllers deployed into the first cluster of the VI WLD.

For NSX-T based VI WLD, when the first cluster is added to the first VI WLD, the NSX-T Managers (3 in a cluster) are deployed to the Mgmt WLD. Subsequent NSX-T based VI WLDs do not require additional NSX-T mangers but each VI WLD VI is added as a compute manager to NSX-T.

For both NSX-T based VI WLD and NSV-V based VI WLD, the first cluster can be considered a compute-and-edge cluster as it contains both NSX and compute components. NSX virtual routers can be deployed to this first cluster. The second and subsequent clusters in a VI WLD can be considered compute-only clusters as they do not need to host any NSX routing virtual machines.

Note: NSX-T is not yet supported for the Mgmt WLD. Only NSX-V is deployed during the automated deployment of the Management domain using Cloud Builder.

Figure 4.              VI WLD Component Layout with NSX-T and NSX-V VI WLDs

vCenter design

The VI WLD vCenter is deployed by the SDDC Manager when creating a VI WLD. It is deployed in the Mgmt WLD as shown in Figure 4. During deployment, it is added to the existing SSO domain, allowing a single pane of glass to manage both the management and VI WLD vCenters.

Horizon VDI domain

A Horizon domain automates deployment of VMware Horizon components and supporting infrastructure to enable you to deliver virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and remote desktop session host (RDSH) desktops and applications. These desktops can be delivered as persistent, linked clones, or instant clones. The Horizon domain can include VMware app volumes for dynamic application mounting and User-Environment Manager for a persistent end-user experience.

The Horizon domain consumes one or more VI WLD, but requires additional Horizon desktop management components to be deployed as part of the Horizon workload creation process. The Horizon domain is decoupled from resource provisioning - one or more VI WLD must be created before deploying a Horizon domain. There are several prerequisites that must be completed before deploying a Horizon domain. They are documented in the Prerequisites for a Horizon Domain.

During the Horizon domain deployment, one to three connection servers and a corresponding load balancer is deployed. You can also choose the optional components that you want to deploy:

• Composer Server
• App Volumes
• User Environment Manager
• Unified Access Gateway

The Horizon domain is based on the Horizon reference architecture, which uses Pod Block architecture to enable you to scale as your use cases grow. For more information about the architecture and number of supported virtual machines, see the Horizon 7 Pod and Block section in the VMware Workspace ONE and VMware Horizon 7 Enterprise Edition On-premises Reference Architecture document.