[lunar.lab] NSX-T Deploy & Initial Configuration

Disclaimer:

• This is for lunar.lab only and not intended as a guide for production environment. I’m aware that some configurations I use here are not supported configuration. 
• All deployed on vSphere environment. 
• I use nested environment. 
• The official documentation is here: https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-NSX-T/2.1/com.vmware.nsxt.install.doc/GUID-414C33B3-674F-44E0-94B8-BFC0B9056B33.html
• The documentation is quite clear, I just add some notes specific to my deployment. 

Step-by-step:

• Deploy
• NSX-T Manager: https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-NSX-T/2.1/com.vmware.nsxt.install.doc/GUID-FA0ABBBD-34D8-4DA9-882D-085E7E0D269E.html
• NSX-T Controller (for lab purpose I only deploy 1 NSX-T Controller): https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-NSX-T/2.1/com.vmware.nsxt.install.doc/GUID-24428FD4-EC8F-4063-9CF9-D8136740963A.html
• NSX-T Edge (for lab purpose I only deploy 1 NSX-T Edge): Please note that PKS requires Large (8 vCPU 16GB RAM) size of NSX-T Edge Node. https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-NSX-T/2.1/com.vmware.nsxt.install.doc/GUID-AECC66D0-C968-4EF2-9CAD-7772B0245BF6.html

vSAN Effective Capacity - Quick and Dirty Sizer Tool

Found this online tool to quickly approximate how much datastore capacity you can get from a certain number of vSAN hosts with certain configuration. I think this is very useful in the case where you already have certain number of physical hosts with vSAN compatible disks, and you want to determine how much capacity you can get from it, and the capacity of cache disk you need to provide to fulfil the 10% recommendation of cache capacity compare to consumed storage (reference). In my experience, I have seen couple of customers where they already have considerably new server hardware with vSAN compatible components where they want to see what they will get if they use vSAN. Please note that VMware has official vSAN Sizing Calculator where you can get recommendation of the hardware specification you need to provide to accommodate certain number of workloads (VMs).

vSphere 5.5 End of General Support Reminder

Maintain Full Level of Support by Upgrading Your vSphere Environment

In 2016 I wrote a note regarding vSphere upgrade because a lot of my customer at that time was doing upgrade due to vSphere 5.1 EoGS (End of General Support) phase. Well, it’s 2018, and this time you may already aware that vSphere 5.5 will enter EoGS phase in 19 September 2018. Which means, if you still have ESXi hosts 5.5 and/or vCenter Server 5.5, you’ll need to upgrade them in order to maintain your level of full support and subscription services as referenced here.

Source: https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/support/product-lifecycle-matrix.pdf

Maximum Supported CPU on Windows Server 2003

Even though Windows Server 2003 has gone into end of support since July 2015, I still find their existence in my customer environment. Last week, a performance issue raised by one of my customer, where it related with application running on Windows Server 2003. The application just migrated from physical to virtual about 2 weeks before the application team observed slower performance during end of month process. When migrated, they changed the configuration from 2 CPU socket x 4 cores/socket into 4 CPU vSocket x 4 vCores/vSocket. Related to that change, my first thought, do we hit any maximum CPU limit? What is the maximum CPU on Windows Server 2003? This article is a self note about maximum CPU supported on Windows Server 2003.

Remember that Windows Server 2003 released in the era where the standard is single core CPU. Looking at the official document from Microsoft such as this document shows the supported Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) each edition of Windows Server 2003. For instance, Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition support 4-way SMP. Now the question is what’s defined as 4-way SMP? I found this VMware kb article which says that 4-way SMP means 4 CPU socket (or 4 vSocket in vSphere environment).

Build a Case for Infrastructure & Operation Automation Initiative

This post is part of blog post series focusing on how a company might kickstart their automation or cloud journey.
Part 1: Improve IT Service Delivery Quality with Automation
Part 2: Build a Case for Infrastructure & Operation Automation Initiative (this post)

Couple of days ago my newsfeed brought me to this paper from Gartner with title “How to Measure the Potential Value of Your I&O Automation Initiatives”. You may get access to this publication freely through this link. I found this paper is really interesting as it greatly summarized what I always try to told my customer when they want to start their automation or cloud journey. On my previous post “Improve IT Service Delivery Quality with Automation”, I highlighted some use cases taken by some company to kick start their automation journey, which happened to be aligned with what explained in this Gartner’s publication.

What initially caught my attention and makes me read the whole paper was the recommendations I quoted below:

I&O leaders who are optimizing operations and need to show the value of their automation spend should:

• Justify I&O automation initiatives by focusing first on efficiency improvements in labor usage and on effectiveness gains in quality, consistency, agility and risk reduction.