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blogs (3)

uCPE Hypervisor Network Functions Virtualization Sizing Guideline

Dennis Qin Dennis Qin

Tue, 06 Sep 2022 17:56:43 -0000

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This document describes how to make proper NFV sizing estimate and choose a right VEP model.

VEP4600 powered by Intel Xeon D CPU, hyperthreading function can be enabled or disabled in BIOS settings. The following screenshot shows the BIOS hyperthreading enable configuration.

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 If hyperthreading is enabled in VEP4600 BIOS settings, ESXi web UI displays that the logical processor count is 16, which is the double of physical CPU core count.

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Description automatically generated If hyperthreading is disabled, ESXi displays that the logical core count is the same as CPU core count.

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Hypervisor undersubscription and oversubscription

Size of VM/NFV

Here is a sample profile of VMware SD-WAN Edge running as a VM in ESXi.

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 It takes two CPU cores from the total logical core/processor count in ESXi. If the total core count is larger than the ESXi core count, for example, in our previous VEP4600 eight core ESXi model, with hyperthreading enabled, the total core count is 16. If total VM/NFV core count is bigger than 16, then the ESXi hypervisor is running in oversubscription mode, meaning the hypervisor has to multiplexer among these NFVs, suspend one of them from time to time. If the total core count is less than 16, ESXi is running in undersubscription mode, no multiplexer is required, all NFVs can run simultaneously in ESXi hypervisor.

Use ESXi monitor feature to display graphical view of CPU/core performance.

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VEP1405 Atom/Denverton CPU

 In VEP1405 platform, Intel Deverton CPU does not support hyperthreading, the logical core count is always the same as physical CPU core count.

Summary

In VEP4600 platform, make sure to enable hyperthreading in BIOS to double the core count. Check every NFV/VM profile running in ESXi to make sure the total core count is not larger than the ESXi core count, so that it can run ESXi in undersubscription mode. It is still possible to run ESXi in over subscription mode if some of the VMs are not required to constantly hug CPU resource, for example if a VM is a DNS server, then most likely it is not constantly processing DNS client queries.

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Monitoring VEP4600 Hardware components status in VMware ESXi/vCenter

Dennis Qin Dennis Qin

Tue, 06 Sep 2022 17:56:43 -0000

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This document discusses how to use VMware ESXi/vCenter to monitor VEP4600 hardware components status.  

In large scale VEP4600 deployment, it is critical for corporate data centers to constantly monitor bare metal hardware components status, such as CPU cooling fan speed, temperature and more.  In addition to VEP4600 BMC/IPMI based bare metal HW monitoring mechanism, VMware ESXi and vCenter can display these HW components status.  The following image shows is the sample ESXi HW components status monitor screen:

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 The following image provides a sample vCenter HW components status monitor screen:

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Click the left arrow key to expand all the event entries in this component.

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How to check VEP model name, service tag, and BIOS version in ESXi and vCenter

The following screen shot shows the sample screen to display VEP model, BIOS version, and service tag in ESXi.

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Description automatically generated The following sample screens display the VEP model, BIOS version, and service tag in vCenter.

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 vCenter is a provision tool used to manage multiple ESXi hosts using vCenter. This provides a single source to manage multiple VEP4600 hosts and their hardware components status.

In summary, VMware ESXi and vCenter provides many features to monitor hardware components status and performance. These features are also applicable to VEP4600 ESXi hosts.

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Installing ESXi7.0 with Small Storage Footprint

Dennis Qin Dennis Qin

Tue, 06 Sep 2022 17:56:43 -0000

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Read Time: 0 minutes

This blog provides instructions for installing ESXi7.0 on Dell VEP4600/1405 platforms with small hard disk space consumption. 

In ESXi7.0 release, the default storage used by ESXi is about 138GB, see the following link for more information:  

https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/81166 

This release offers the option to reduce the storage consumption. This blog provides information on how to install ESXi7.0 with small storage footprint.

The ESXI image used in this demonstration is: VMware-VMvisor-Installer-7.0.0.update03-19482537.x86_64-DellEMC_Customized-A04.iso 

This image was tested on VEP4600 8 core model.

 Use Rufus on Windows to prepare a bootable USB thumb drive. Select the right ESXi7.0.3 ISO file.

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Use the default settings for all other options. Click OK to start the USB preparation process.

 

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Once the process is complete, close Rufus.

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Open Windows File Explorer, go to the following file on the prepared bootable USB thumb drive:

 ESXi bootable USB->efi->boot.cfg

Open the file using Windows notepad utility.

Modify this line in the file:

Before: kernelopt=runweasel cdromBoot

After: kernelopt=runweasel cdromBoot systemMediaSize=min

Choose from the following configuration options for the systemMediaSize:

  • min      33GB, for single disk or embedded servers
  • small    69GB, for servers with at least 512GB RAM
  • max      all available space, for multi-terabyte servers

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After the installation, log on to ESXi vSphere web ui. Click the storage menu on the left side panel and then click the devices tab on the right side of the screen.

 

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Click the first hard disk device.

VMFSL is the new partition introduced in ESXi7.0. with the min systemMediaSzie option. VMFSL uses about 24 GB.

 
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The default systemMediaSize is about 120GB.

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In summary, we can use this systemMediaSize option in the bootable USB to control the hard disk space consumption. This can be especially useful when installing ESXi7.0 in some VEP models that come with a small SSD capacity.

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