Category: VMWare

ESXi : Deployment Guide

1)       If VMFS LUNs are presented, unpresent LUNs or remove Virtual Connect FC SAN configuration from the servers virtual connect profile. There is a risk these LUNs will be formatted during setup if this is not completed.

 If this is a rebuild of an existing host, perform the following steps:

 1.       In Command View, find the VMware cluster “host” entry.

2.       Identify the pair of WWNs that relate to the host to be removed – cross-reference with fabric zones or Virtual Connect profile.

3.       In the example image, WWNs for EUVM06 have been circled. The entries are not always adjacent so take care!

4.       Click ‘Delete Port’ and choose the WWN from the pull down.

5.       Only 1 port can be deleted at a time.

 

 2)       Create new VC profile for the ESX server (NOTE you can copy an existing EUVM profile to save a lot of time)

 

Port 1 + 2 Multiple Network Configuration

Click the paper/pencil icon to access this screen

 

Port 3 + 4 Multiple Network Configuration

Click the paper/pencil icon to access this screen

         Port 5 + 6 Multiple Network Configuration

        

3)       Set BIOS Power Management Configuration:

a.       Reboot the server and enter the Rom Based Setup Utility (RBSU)

b.       Select Power Management Options

c.        Select HP Power Profile

d.       Select Maximum Performance

e.        Verify that HP Power regulator is now set to HP Static High Performance Mode

4)       Upgrade firmware:

a.       BIOS – mount BL465cG7_A19October2010 as a virtual USB driver and boot server.

b.       CNA – Boot from OneConnect-Flash-2.102.517.7.iso

c.        ILO – flash ILO3 via Web Interface using ilo3_115.bin

5)       Install ESXi 4.1 (HP OEM version) – The ISO file is HP-ESXi_41.iso

 

6)       Present VMFS LUNs / new data stores to ESXi host – via Command View. Note you will have to shutdown the ESXi server and re-enable the SAN Fabric connections on the servers Virtual Connect profile if these were disabled previously.

7)       Perform post-configuration requirements: (note there is no root password by default)

• Set root password – use the configure password option in the ILO console
• Set vmnic0 and vmnic1 as management NICS:

 

 

You will need to set the VLAN ID of the management network using the VLAN (optional) menu, set the VLAN to 120

 Set IP address, DNS servers, hostname (upper case hostname, lower case domain name)

 

 8)       Create forward and reverse DNS lookup records in Active Directory DNS for the new ESXi server (manual requirement for VMware HA to function correctly)

 9)       Enable SSH Tech Support Mode from ILO console

 

 

 10)   Modify hosts file, add entries for EUVCENTER01/02 both with IP 10.144.110.110, essential for VMHA. Login via SSH and enter the command vi /etc/hosts

 

 Press ‘i’ to insert new text and add the following lines:

 10.144.110.110 EUVCENTER01.domain.local EUVCENTER01

10.144.110.110 EUVCENTER02.domain.local EUVCENTER02

 

 Press Escape, then enter the following characters ‘:wq’ This will save the file and exit the text editor.

 11)   Import the new VM host into vCenter at the Datacenter level

 

 12)   Configure Time Server Settings, (per server). To access this console, login to the vCenter GUI, select a host and then select the configuration tab. Finally select the Time Configuration option.

 Click the Options button:

 Select NTP Settings

 

Click Add, and enter 10.44.90.1, then perform the same for 10.44.90.2:

 

 13)   Configure Distributed Switch Networking (as per Virtual Connect configuration)

 Adapters must be added to the dvSwitch as follows:

 

Vmnic0	Management/vMotion dvSwitch
Vmnic1	Management/vMotion dvSwitch
Vmnic2	Internal dvSwitch
Vmnic3	Internal dvSwitch
Vmnic4	Ecommerce dvSwitch
Vmnic5	Ecommerce dvSwitch

 To add host adapters to Distributed Switches browse to Home > Networking

 

 Expand the list of distributed switches:

 

 Referring to the table above we’ll now add the correct physical adapters to the distributed virtual switches. Right-click the distributed switch you wish to add the host to, in this case dvSwitch_Management/vMotion and select ‘Add host to vNetwork Distributed Switch…’

 

 Select the host and then select the correct adapters for the Distributed Switch, then click Next

 

 You must migrate the vmk0 (management interface) to port group dvPortGroup_Internal_VLAN120 otherwise you will lose connectivity with the ESXi host, click the assign port group button:

 

 Select dvPortGroup_Internal_VLAN120 then click OK:

 

 Click Next

 

  Click Next

 

 Click Finish, wait for the task to finish – you can see the status in the task status window.

 

 14)   Now add the adapters to the Internal and Ecommerce distributed vSwitch, you do not need to migrate any vmk interfaces, just click next on this window.

 15)   In the Hosts and Clusters window select the new host, then the configuration tab, select Networking and finally vNetwork Distributed Switch. Click Manage Virtual Adapters

 

We must now define the vMotion and Fault Tolerance vmk interfaces (vmk1 vMotion and vmk2 FT)

The following configuration should be present when you have finished configuration at this stage:

• vmk0 – VLAN120 – Management
• vmk1 – VLAN121 – vMotion
• vmk2 – VLAN122 – Fault Tolerance

 Click Add

 

Click Next

 

 Click Next

 

 Select the correct VLAN port group for the virtual adapter function (as per definitions above) then select the correct function for the virtual adapter; in this case VLAN 121 and vMotion, then click Next

 

 Enter an IP address for the correct VLAN, don’t change the Default Gateway, the host can only have a single default gateway. Finally click Next

 

Click Finish to apply the change

 

 Perform the same for vmk2 for VMware FT:

 

 Final configuration should be as follows:

 

16)   Ensure that the host can see all of the data stores, select the host, then the configuration tab and select Storage

 17)   Install patches/updates using the VMware vSphere CLI

Place host you wish to update in maintenance mode

 Copy the SVE-be2net-2.102.554.0-offline_bundle-347594.zip, hpq-esxi4.1uX-bundle-1.0a.zip and hp-nmi-bundle-1.1.02.zip files to your local C:\.

Using the vSphere CLI install the network driver update for the CAN, you’ll need to change the hostname:

    vihostupdate.pl –server server01 –install –bundle “C:\SVE-be2net-2.102.554.0-offline_bundle-347594.zip” –bulletin SVE-be2net-2.102.554.0

 Now copy the hp-esxi4.1uX-bundle-1.0a.zip and hp-nmi-bundle-1.1.02.zip files to c:\ then execute the following vSphere CLI commands:

vihostupdate.pl –server server01 –install –bundle “C:\hp-esxi4.1uX-bundle-1.0a.zip” –bulletin hpq-esxi4.1uX-bundle-1.0a

 vihostupdate.pl –server server01 –install –bundle “C:\hp-nmi-bundle-1.1.02.zip” –bulletin hp-nmi-driver-1.1.02

18)   For active/active storage (EVA8400) you must configure the multi-path options for the host.

 This can be completed in two ways, the easiest of which is using the VMWare PowerCLI

 Once installed, change the server name and use the following commands to configure the storage correctly on the new host:

connect-viserver euvcenter01

$vmhost = get-VMhost server01.domain.local

Get-VMHost $vmhost | Get-ScsiLun -CanonicalName “naa.6001438005*” | Where {$_.MultipathPolicy -ne “RoundRobin”}

Get-VMHost $vmhost | Get-ScsiLun -CanonicalName “naa.6001438005*” | Where {$_.MultipathPolicy -ne “RoundRobin”} | Set-ScsiLun -MultipathPolicy “roundrobin”

Using the GIU, the same result can be achieved from the Hosts and Clusters tab, select the new host, select Configuration, then select Storage.

Right-click the VMFS datastore you wish to change the settings on and select properties, the click Manage Paths:

 

 You can view the current multipath selection mode; click the drop-down box to change this to Round Robin, once done click Change.

 

 You must complete this for every EVA8400 volume.

 You can verify the change in the host storage window:

 

 19.    Configure vMA logging; open an SSH connection to vma01.domain.local

                vifp addserver server01.domain.local

(You’ll be prompted for a password)

 

 Now setup logging for the new host:

vilogger enable –server euvm05.domain.local –numrotation 20 –maxfilesize 10 –collectionperiod 10

 

       Verify that logging is working for the server (all servers will be listed, just look for the new one):

 

20.    Configure ServersAlive Alerts for the new server.

21.    Add the server to the cluster (if applicable) – simply drag and drop via the Hosts and Clusters window.