Mnimum vSphere version for NSX-T 2.4

vCenter 6.71Ub
ESXi 6.7U1 with patch ESXi670-201901001

 

 

Add Compute Manager (vCenter)

Login to NSX Manager, under System | Fabric | Compute Managers click on +ADD

 

Insert vCenter informations and credential, click ADD

Accept vCenter Thumbrint

 

After some seconds vCenter will be registered

 

 

 

Create a new Transport Zone for Overlay Network

 

Under System | Fabric | Transport Zones click +ADD

 

 

Insert/Select

• Transport Zone name
• NVDS name
• Leave default for Host Membership Criteria (Standard)
• Leave default for Trafic Type (Overlay)

The Host Membership Criteria in Enhanced Datapath can be used only for vSphere 6.7 Hosts and it’s based on DPDK libraries. Possibly, don’t use feature based on DPDK if you run a nested lab that use Ryzen processor. I have some problems on my lab based on AMD processor (see in the next posts) during Edge VMs deployment (that use these libraries).

The new TZ is deployed succesfully

 

Create a new Uplink Profile for multi VTEP setup

Under System | Profiles | Uplink Profiles clicck +ADD

 

I need an Uplink Profile to support multi VTEP deployment that use VLAN 113 (my underlay network).

• Type a name, in my case nsx-esxi-multi-vteps-uplink-profile (Note multi VTEP is supported only on vSphere environments).
• Select [Default Teaming] and change Teaming Policy from Failover to LBS, click on Active Uplinks field and add “uplink-2”
• Under Transport VLAN type 113 (in my case)
• Modify MTU value as you prefer or leave blank (the default is 1600)
• Click ADD

The new Uplink Profile is created.

 

 

Create a VTEP IP Pool for ESXi Hosts

Under Networking | IP Address Management | IP Address Pools click on ADD IP ADDRESS POOL button

 

• Type an IP range on IP Ranges field (I need 6 IPs in my case to setup a vSphere Cluster with 3 Hosts)
• Type the network/netmask
• Type a default GW IP
• Click to ADD and APPLY

VTEP IP POOL done!

 

 

Create a Transport Node Profile

Under System | Fabric | Profiles | Transport Node Profile clicck +ADD

 

• Type a Transport Node Profile name –> TNP-esxi
• Select TZ-Overlay  and move to “Selected” box
• Click on N-VDS button to insert all NSX objects created in the previous steps

 

On the New Node Switch box select:

• N-VDS –> NVDS-Overlay (TZ-Overlay will be automattically selected)
• NIOC Profile –> select the default profile
• Uplink Profile –> nsx-esxi-multi-vteps-uplink-profile
• LLDP Profile –> LLDP [Send Packet Disabled] (or select as you need)
• IP Assignment –> Use IP Pool
• IP Pool –> ESXI_VTEP_IP_POOL
• Physical NICs –> type vmnic2 for uplink-1 and vmnic3 for uplink-2
• ADD

Ok, now we are ready to prepare vSphere infrastructure

 

 

NSX-T preparation

Under System | Fabric | Nodes | Host Transport Nodes select Managed By drop down menu and select right vCenter, all vSphere Clusters managed by Compute Manager will be show, select Compute-Cluster and click on CONFIGURE NSX button

 

Select the TNP-esxi profile just created and SAVE

After some minutes all ESXi in the vSphere Cluster will be ready

 

vSphere Infrastructure checks

Selecting an ESXi from vCenter we can verify N-VDS deployment

vmnic2 and vmnic3 are used by Transport Node Profile (TNP-esxi) setup

A new custom TCP/IP stack is created on ESXi (VXLAN…but the Overlay use Geneve)

From vSphere Client the VTEP interfaces are not displayed…but from esxcli you can verify the configuration.