VM Management NIC Teaming

[BlackCode20]

Hi Guys,

we get a new ESXi Cluster with Enterprise Plus with the following Network Config:

2x 1G NIC

6x 10G NIC

With the new ESXI Cluster i want realise the following Network Config:

x VM Data Traffic NIC Teaming (ACTIVE/ACTIVE) LACP to our Juniper Core Switch Stack 10G Uplink

x VM-Motion Traffic NIC Teaming (ACTIVE/PASSIVE) LACP to our Juniper Core Switch Stack 10G Uplink

x ESXI Hostmanagement NIC Teaming (?/?) LACP to our Juniper Management Switch Stack 1G Uplink

I have read a lot of the VMware Best Practice Guides and seen a lot of Blogs about NIC Teaming but i don´t find a hint about the Recommend Management NIC Teaming Settings.

Are the Setting the same as the vMotion Settings with (Actice/Passive)?

Thanks

[daphnissov]

First of all, I would do away with any LACP on any of the NICs. You don't need it with an Enterprise Plus license as Load-Based Teaming (LBT) is a better choice and requires no special, upstream switch configuration. The following would be a good configuration:

2 x 1 GbE: Management (Active/Standby)

2 x 10 GbE: vMotion (Active/Active)

2 x 10 GbE: VM Traffic (Active/Active)

This will leave 2 10 GbE NICs at your disposal for future use, important for things like NSX-T which require dedicated, physical NICs.