E2E Deployment and Operations Guide with Switchless Networking: Microsoft HCI Solutions from Dell Technologies

• 1

  Deployment Introduction
• 2

  Document overview
• 3

  Audience and scope
• 4

  Known issues

• 1

  Solution Overview
• 2

  Solution introduction
• 3

  Deployment models
• 4

  Solution integration and network connectivity

• 1

  Solution Deployment
• 2

  Solution deployment introduction
• 3

  Deployment prerequisites
• 4

  Predeployment configuration
• 5

  Cabling instructions
• 6

  Operating system deployment
• 7

  Install roles and features
• 8

  Verifying and updating firmware and software compliance with the Azure Stack HCI catalog
• 9

  Change the hostname
• 10

  Joining cluster nodes to an Active Directory domain
• 11

  Configuring firewall settings

• 1

  Switchless Architecture with Network ATC
• 2

  Requirements for switchless storage network topologies
• 3

  Configure host networking
• 4

  Setup IPs manually on SMB NICs
• 5

  Creating a cluster
• 6

  Creating network intents for switchless
• 7

  Enabling Storage Spaces Direct
• 8

  Configuring the host management network as a lower-priority network for live migration
• 9

  Updating the page file settings
• 10

  Configuring a cluster witness
• 11

  Best practices and recommendations
• 12

  Enabling bit locker
• 13

  Recommended next steps
• 14

  Deployment services

• 1

  References
• 2

  Dell Technologies documentation
• 3

  Microsoft documentation

• 1

  GPU Integration
• 2

  Installing and configuring GPUs on AX platforms
• 3

  GPU Discrete Device Assignment (DDA) on Azure Stack HCI
• 4

  GPU partitioning

• 1

  Day 1 operations
• 2

  Azure onboarding for Azure Stack HCI operating system
• 3

  PAL and DPOR registration for Azure Stack
• 4

  Creating virtual disks

• 1

  Managing and monitoring clusters with Windows Admin Center
• 2

  Overview
• 3

  Access the HCI cluster
• 4

  View server details
• 5

  View drive details
• 6

  Managing and monitoring volumes
• 7

  Enabling data deduplication on Storage Spaces Direct
• 8

  Monitoring and managing VMs
• 9

  Managing virtual switches

• 1

  Dell OpenManage Integration with Windows Admin Center
• 2

  Overview
• 3

  Prerequisites for managing AX nodes
• 4

  Installing the OMIMSWAC license
• 5

  Managing Microsoft HCI-based clusters
• 6

  Full Stack Cluster-Aware Offline Updating
• 7

  Full Stack Cluster-Aware Updating for Azure Stack HCI clusters using the OpenManage Integration snap-in
• 8

  Updating a standalone node before adding it to the cluster
• 9

  Secure cluster with Secured-core
• 10

  Enabling operating system features
• 11

  Protect your infrastructure with infrastructure lock
• 12

  Manage CPU cores in Azure Stack HCI clusters
• 13

  Validate and remediate Azure Stack HCI clusters
• 14

  Onboard Dell policies to Azure Arc from Windows Admin Center to manage Azure Stack HCI clusters
• 15

  View recommendations for storage expansion
• 16

  Known issues

• 1

  Updates and maintenance
• 2

  Firmware and driver updates using the manual method
• 3

  Restarting a cluster node or taking a cluster node offline
• 4

  Extending volumes
• 5

  Performing AX node recovery
• 6

  Operating system recovery

• 1

  References
• 2

  Dell Technologies documentation
• 3

  Microsoft documentation