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Dell VxRail Network Planning Guide
Introduction Plan the VxRail network VxRail Cluster Types VxRail feature-driven decision points VxRail hardware and switch selection decision points Prepare the data center to implement VxRail Plan the VxRail cluster implementation Planning vSAN Witness Networking Planning VxRail Satellite Nodes Networking Configure the Network for VxRail Prepare to build the VxRail cluster VxRail network considerations after implementation Appendix A: VxRail Network Configuration Table Appendix B: VxRail Passwords Appendix C: VxRail cluster setup checklist
Appendix C: VxRail cluster setup checklist
Appendix D: VxRail Open Ports Requirements Appendix E: VMware VDS port group default settings Appendix F: Physical Network Switch Examples

Appendix C: VxRail cluster setup checklist

Appendix C: VxRail cluster setup checklist

  • Follow the checklist to set up the cluster.

    • VxRail cluster: Plan for additional nodes beyond the initial three (or four)-node cluster. You can have up to 64 nodes in a VxRail cluster.
    • VxRail ports: Determine how many ports to configure per VxRail node, what port type, and what network speed.
    • Network switches: Ensure that your switches support VxRail requirements and provides the connectivity option that you chose for your VxRail nodes. Verify cable requirements.
    • Data center: Verify that the required external applications for VxRail are accessible over the network and correctly configured.
    • Topology: If you are deploying VxRail over more than one rack, be sure that network connectivity is set up between the racks. Determine the L2/L3 boundary in the planned network topology.
    • Workstation/laptop: Any operating system with a browser to access the VxRail Manager. The latest versions of Firefox, Chrome, and Internet Explorer 10+ are all supported.
    • Out-of-band Management (optional): One available port that supports 1 Gb for each VxRail node.
    Component Description
    Reserve VLANs

    One external management VLA

    One internal management VLAN with multicast for autodiscovery and device management. The default is 3939.

    One VLAN with unicast enabled for VMware vSAN traffic

    One VLAN for VMware vSphere vMotion

    One or more VLANs for your VM Guest Networks

    One VLAN for VMware vCenter Server Network (if applicable)

    If you are enabling witness traffic separation, reserve one VLAN for the VxRail witness traffic separation network.

    System

    Select the timezone.

    Select the top-level domain.

    Hostname or IP address of the NTP servers on your network (recommended)

    IP address of the DNS servers on your network (if external DNS)

    Forward and reverse DNS records for VxRail management components (if external DNS).

    Management

    Decide on your VxRail host naming scheme. The naming scheme applies to all VxRail management components.

    Reserve IP addresses for VMware ESXi hosts.

    Reserve one IP address for VxRail Manager

    Determine default gateway and subnet mask.

    Select passwords for VxRail management components.

    vCenter

    Determine whether to use a VMware vCenter Server that is customer-supplied or a VMware vCenter provided by VxRail.

    VxRail vCenter Server: Reserve IP addresses for VMware vCenter Server (if supplied by VxRail).

    Customer-managed VMware vCenter Server: Determine hostname and IP address for vCenter, administration user, and name of VMware vSphere data center. Create a VxRail management user in VMware vCenter. Select a unique VxRail cluster name. (Optional) Create a VxRail nonadmin user.

    Virtual Distributed Switch

    Preconfigure a customer-managed VMware VDS or have VxRail deploy a VMware VDS in your VMware vCenter instance.

    Customer-managed VMware VDS: Configure target port groups for required VxRail networks.

    vMotion

    Decide whether you want to use the default TCP-IP stack for VMware vMotion, or a separate IP addressing scheme for the dedicated VMware vMotion TCP-IP stack.

    Reserve IP addresses and a subnet mask for VMware vSphere vMotion.

    Select the gateway for either the default TCP-IP stack, or the dedicated VMware vMotion TCP-IP stack.

    vSAN

    Reserve IP addresses and a subnet mask for vSAN, if using vSAN for primary storage.

    Logging

    To use VMware vRealize Log Insight: Reserve one IP address.

    To use an existing syslog server: Get the hostname or IP address of your third-party syslog server.

    Witness Site

    If a witness is required, reserve one IP address for the management network and one IP address for the vSAN network.

    Workstation

    Configure your workstation/laptop to reach the VxRail initial IP address.

    Ensure you know how to configure the laptop to reach the VxRail Manager IP address after configuration.

    Set up Switches

    Configure your selected external management VLAN (default is untagged/native).

    Configure your internal management VLAN.

    Confirm unicast is enabled for device discovery.

    Configure your selected VLANs for VMware vSAN, VMware vSphere vMotion, VMware vCenter Server Network and VM Guest Networks.

    If applicable, configure your witness traffic separation VLAN.

    In dual-switch environments, configure the interswitch links to carry traffic between switches.

    Configure uplinks or point-to-points links to carry networks requiring external connectivity upstream.

    Configure one port as an access port for laptop/workstation to connect to VxRail Manager for initial configuration.

    Confirm configuration and network access.

    Workstation/Laptop

    Configure your workstation/laptop to reach the VxRail Manager initial IP address.

    Configure the laptop to reach the VxRail Manager IP address after permanent IP address assignment.