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E2E Deployment and Operations Guide with Switchless Networking (Windows)
Deployment Introduction Solution Overview Solution Deployment
Solution Deployment
Solution deployment introduction
Deployment prerequisites
Predeployment configuration
Operating system deployment
Install roles and features
Verifying firmware and software compliance with the support matrix
Update out-of-box drivers
Change the hostname
Joining cluster nodes to an Active Directory domain
Configuring firewall settings
Network integration overview Switchless Architecture Additional guidance for all configurations Deploying and Configuring a Host Cluster Persistent Memory for Windows Server HCI Day 1 operations Managing and monitoring clusters with Windows Admin Center Dell OpenManage Integration with Windows Admin Center Updates and maintenance

Operating system deployment

Operating system deployment

  • These instructions are for manual deployment of the Windows Server 2019 or Windows Server 2022 operating system. Unless otherwise specified, perform the steps on each physical node in the infrastructure that will be a part of Azure Stack HCI.

    Note: The steps in the subsequent sections are applicable to either the full operating system or Server Core.
    Note: The command output that is shown in the subsequent sections might show only Mellanox ConnectX-4 LX adapters as physical adapters. The output is shown only as an example.




    Manual operating system deployment

    Dell Lifecycle Controller and iDRAC provide operating system deployment options. Options include manual installation or unattended installation by using virtual media and the operating system deployment feature in Lifecycle Controller for Windows Server 2019 and Windows Server 2022 operating system.

    A step-by-step procedure for deploying the operating system is not within the scope of this guide.

    This guide assumes that:
    • Windows Server 2019 or Windows Server 2022 operating system version 22H2 installation on the physical server is complete.
    • You have access to the iDRAC virtual console of the physical server.
    Note: For information about installing the operating system using the iDRAC virtual media feature, see the Using the Virtual Media function on iDRAC 6, 7, 8 and 9 Dell Knowledge Base article.

    Factory-installed operating system deployment

    If the cluster nodes are shipped from Dell Technologies with a preinstalled operating system, complete the out-of-box experience (OOBE):

    • Select language and locale settings.
    • Accept the Microsoft and OEM EULAs.
    • Set up a password for the local administrator account.
    • Update the operating system partition size, and shrink it as needed.

    The OEM operating system is preactivated and the Hyper-V role is predeployed for Windows Server 2019/2022. After completing the OOBE steps, perform the steps in Install roles and features to complete the cluster deployment and Storage Spaces Direct configuration.

    The Azure Stack HCI operating system factory image has multilingual support for these languages: English, German, French, Spanish, Korean, Japanese, Polish, and Italian. To change language:

    • Run the following PowerShell commands. <LANGUAGE> can be en-US, fr-FR, ja-JP, ko-KR, de-DE, pl-PL, it-IT, or es-ES.

      • Set-WinUserLanguageList <LANGUAGE>
      • Set-WinSystemLocale -systemlocale <LANGUAGE>
    • Reboot after running the commands.
    Note: For all of the languages except Polish, the main screen changes to the appropriate font. For Polish, the English font is used.

    If you purchased a license for a secondary operation system to run your virtual machines, the VHD file is located in the C:\Dell_OEM\VM folder. Copy this VHD file to a virtual disk in your Azure Stack HCI cluster and create virtual machines using this VHD.

    Note: Do not run your virtual machine with the VHD file residing on the BOSS device (for example, c:\). It should always be on c:\clusterstorage\<VD1>