When deploying a VxRail appliance into an existing VMware virtualization infrastructure, use the customer-supplied vCenter Server that is managing the current environment to also manage the VxRail appliance. This allows an external central vCenter Server to manage multiple VxRail clusters in a single management instance.

The customer-supplied vCenter Server can be:

• Standalone with an embedded PSC or external PSC (external PSC is deprecated starting with version 7.0)
• A vCenter Server appliance virtual machine or vCenter Server for Windows (vCenter Server for Windows has been deprecated starting with vSphere 7.0)
• Using Enhanced Linked Mode

Requirements

• In versions earlier than VxRail 4.5.200, the customer-supplied vCenter cannot be hosted on the VxRail cluster it is managing.
• Starting with VxRail 4.5.200, the customer-supplied vCenter Server can be hosted on the VxRail cluster it is managing, except for 2-node clusters. You must shut down the vCenter Server in order to use the shutdown cluster feature.
• Check the VxRail Release Notes to determine the proper version numbers. The ESXi version hosting the vCSA should be running version 6.0 or later. 

• VxRail 4.0.x and vSphere 6.0 VxRail Appliance Software 4.0.x Release Notes
• VxRail 4.5.x and vSphere 6.5 VxRail Appliance Software 4.5.x Release Notes
• VxRail 4.7.x and vSphere 6.7 VxRail Appliance Software 4.7.x Release Notes
• VxRail 7.x and vSphere 7.0 VxRail Appliance Software 7.x Release Notes 

• You must provide the vCenter Server license.

If you want VxRail to join a customer-supplied vCenter Server, you must:

• Know the customer-supplied vCenter Server FQDN.
• Know whether your customer-supplied vCenter Server has an embedded or nonembedded PSC. If the PSC is nonembedded, you will need the PSC FQDN.
• Know the Existing Single Sign-On domain (SSO) (for example, vsphere.local).
• Create a VxRail management user and password for this VxRail cluster on the customer-supplied vCenter Server. This user must be:

• Created with no permissions
• Created with no roles assigned to it

Note: If a previous VxRail cluster has been deployed on the customer-supplied vCenter Server, the same VxRail Management User can be reused for additional VxRail clusters that are managed by the same vCenter Server.

• Create or select a data center on the customer-supplied vCenter Server for the VxRail cluster to join.
• Specify the name of the cluster that is created by VxRail in the selected data center when the cluster is built. This is also the name of the distributed switch. This name must be unique and not used anywhere in the data center on the customer-supplied vCenter Server.
• Verify that the DNS server can resolve all VxRail ESXi hostnames before deployment.
• (Optional) Create a VxRail non-admin user and password for VxRail on the customer-supplied vCenter Server. The following will be performed by your Dell EMC Representative:

• Create two new roles, VxRail Initial Global and VxRail Datacenter Global.
• Assign each of these roles to the new VxRail admin user.

Note: Starting with VxRail 4.5.200, you can deploy a customer-supplied vCenter Server on an existing VxRail cluster, even the one it is managing. You must still provide a vCenter Server license.