ESXi Host and Virtual Machine Setup

ESXi networking provides communication between VMs on the same host and on different hosts, and between other virtual and physical hosts. It also manages ESXi hosts and communicates between VMkernel services and the physical network.

To set up networking, follow these procedures:

1. Add the cluster hosts to VDS.

2. Add network adapters to VMs.

Add cluster hosts to VDS

1. On the vSphere Web Client Home screen, click Networking.
2. Right-click oraPub VDS and click Add and Manage Hosts.
3. Select Add hosts and click Next.
4. Click New hosts and select the hosts to be added.
5. Click OK and Next.

6. Ensure that Manage physical adapters and Manage VMkernel adapters are selected, and then click Next.
7. On each ESXi host, select the vmnic that is reserved for public and vMotion traffic and assign it to uplink 1, as shown in Figure 32.

Figure 32.       Assigning an uplink to an adapter

8. Repeat the preceding steps for each ESXi host, assigning the other vmnic reserved for public and vMotion traffic to uplink2.
9. Right-click a host and click New Adapter to add a VMkernel port for vMotion.
10. Select Select an existing network and click Browse to select the vMotion port group, as shown in Figure 33.

Figure 33.       Selecting the port group

11. Click OK and Next.
12. At Port group properties, select VMotion traffic and click Next.
13. Select Use Static IPV4 settings, provide the details, and click Finish.
14. Repeat steps 9 through 13 to add a VMkernel port for each host.
15. Repeat steps 1 through 8 to add cluster hosts and vmnics to oraPriv VDS. Be sure to select the two vmnics reserved for Oracle private interconnect traffic.

Add network adapters to VMs

After adding cluster hosts to VDS, add network adapters to VMs as follows:

1. In the vSphere Web Client, right-click the VM and select Edit Settings.

2. From the New device list box, select Network and click Add.

The new network adapter appears at the bottom of the list.

3. Optionally, expand the new network, and change the Status settings.

• Connected—Select this option when the VM is running to connect or disconnect the VM network adapter. This option is not available when the VM is not running.
• Connect at power on—Select this option to connect the virtual network adapter to the network when the VM is on.

4. From the Adapter Type list box, select the network adapter type to use.
5. Optionally, select how to assign MAC addresses—Automatic or Manual.
6. From the New Network list box, select the standard or distributed port group.

The menu lists all standard and distributed port groups that are available for VMs on the host, as shown in Figure 34.

Figure 34.       Selecting the port group

7. If the network adapter is connected to a distributed port group of VDS that has vSphere Network I/O Control version 3 enabled, allocate bandwidth to the adapter.

• From the Shares list box, set the relative priority of the traffic from this VM as shares from the capacity of the connected physical adapter.
• In the Reservation text box, specify a minimum bandwidth that must be available to the VM network adapter when the VM is powered on.
• In the Limit text box, set a limit on the bandwidth that the VM network adapter can consume.   

8. Click OK to add the network adapters.