NSX Adv vs Enterprise design question?

[shorton]

I am designing an HP All flash 3-PAR Metro Cluster 2 sites connected via personal fiber approx 25km looking at using NSX but was not sure about the advantages/disadvantages using an Enterprise NSX licensed multi Cross-VC vs a stretched cluster Advanced NSX licensed single vCenter?

[bayupw]

Have you decided on your vCenter and vSphere design e.g. how many vCenter it will be?

You probably don't need Enterprise if you only have single vCenter server + single NSX Manager.

If you haven't decide on it, you may want to think about recoverability aspects, such as how would you perform site recovery, management layer recovery (vCenter, NSX Manager, NSX Controllers, etc)

Double check the feature comparison here Network Virtualization and Security Platform – NSX | VMware to make sure you don't need any other Enterprise features such as VPN, HW VTEP etc.

There is also a design guide for multi-site including single VC + multisite vSphere Metro Storage Cluster (vMSC) here: NSX-V Multi-site Options and Cross-VC NSX Design Guide

See page 13 on that design guide

[shorton]

Hi Bayu and thanks for the quick response.  I should have mentioned we are currently running vSphere 6 with about 275 VMs with a single vCenter, we have space at a colocation DC that we have dark fiber to.  We run a 3Par 8450 all flash array and are purchasing another one to reside there so we will have a shared storage stretched metro cluster between sites.  I would like my environment to remain as uncomplicated as possible but do not want to limit my options.  When looking at the NSX guide I see if you have vMSC with NSX opposed to NSX with Cross-VC the scope is metro vs geo but the resellers I have talked to are pushing 2 vCenters with Cross-VC and I did not fully understand what I would get or actually need for this configuration?  Why would I want HW VTEP or VPN I guess are the major differences?  thx,  Scott

[bayupw]

The HW VTEP and VPN is just additional considerations.

Just want to share my opinion based on my experiences.

I have personally done NSX multi-site with and without vMSC, with and without cross-VC.

I normally drive customers to go with L3 (no stretch L2 network) and do less cross-VC if possible, to avoid dependency and sharing same failure domain.

This way the sites can work independently

At least that would be the reason if I would like push customers for multi-vcenters esp if there is no compelling reason to do vMSC.

When you have 2 vCenter servers and NSX Managers, it is also not mandatory to connect them with cross-VC.

But of course it depends on your design factors, design requirements etc.

That would also bring us to my points in previous reply, how would you perform vCenter or NSX Manager recovery when you do vMSC.

Will you do vMSC on management cluster too?

I don't think we can change IP address of vCenter & NSX Manager if you are going to failover to the other site.

That normally means you would need to have stretch L2 network for management which some network architect would like to avoid.

In my opinion, you might want to start with the vSphere/vCenter design first whether you want to go with vMSC or not.

Then work work on the NSX design + licensing after that and not the other way around.

So if you have decided for vMSC or no vMSC, then the NSX design just need to have design considerations for the vSphere architecture.

FYI there is a good session on vMSC, SRM, etc in below link - oldie but goodie

INF-BCO2982 - Stretched Clusters and VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager: How and When to Choose On...

vSphere DR/HA: Stretched Cluster or SRMwhich is better/simpler/cheaper? - Virtual Geek