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hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

A question about HA.

Hello.

I have a VMWare ESXi 6 host with a Windows Server VM. I like to run HA. I prepared another server with VMWare ESXi 6 and I want to know on new server I must have a Windows Server VM like host 1? Or I just need to prepare a new server with VMWare ESXi.

Thank you.

15 Replies
PCTechStream
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

How to Configure VMware High Availability (HA) Cluster

TRY LIKE THIS:

https://www.vladan.fr/how-to-configure-vmware-high-availability-ha-cluster/

Raul.

VMware VDI Administrator

http://ITCloudStream.com/

www.ITSA.Cloud
Sakkanan
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Install Vcenter server 6.0 in one VM server.You have keep the VCenter server in 1st / 2nd ESXi 6.0 host.

Create datacenter and cluster in VCenter server.

Add both the ESXi host to cluster.

Enable HA on the Cluster.

SureshKumarMuth
Commander
Commander

Basically HA is used for VM failover during host failure.

1. You need more than one host in the cluster

2. vCenter server is needed to configure HA, vcenter server can be hosted on a physical machine or virtual machine.

In order to configure HA on a cluster, VMs are not necessary to be live on ESXi hosts. You can configure HA on ESXi cluster even when there are no VMs running on the cluster. Having VMs may help you to test HA by initiating failover manually.

Regards,
Suresh
https://vconnectit.wordpress.com/
hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thus, Just one of my ESXi need VM? I mean is the second server just need ESXi without any VM. How ESXi move my failed VM to other host?

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jhague
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

You don't need a second copy of the VM for HA - assuming the VM is on shared storage visible to both hosts. In the event of a failure the VM instance will just be started on the remaining host (from the files on shared storage).

The other thing you can enable is VM monitoring which also gives protection in case of VM failure as well as ESXi host failure. With VM monitoring HA will use VMware Tools running inside the VM as a heartbeat and if it is not responding and there is no I/O activity from the VM, HA will assume it has crashed and restart it in the same way.

John Hague http://linkedin.com/in/john-hague | twitter @jhague10 VCIX-DCV | VCP-DCV 3/4/5/6 | VCP6-NV | VCP7-CMA | VCAP7-CMA Design
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sachu2017
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Its not mandatory to keep VM in second ESXi host to enable HA on cluster and in case  any ESXi host failed, VMs would be rebooted on other host. 

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SureshKumarMuth
Commander
Commander

Both servers can have virtual machines, failover will be done when any of the ESXi host in the cluster fails. Generally, no VMs will be moved, VMs will be restarted on other available hosts by HA master host.

How ESXi move my failed VM to other host?

The failover we are talking here is due to host failure, no VMs will be moved but restarted on other hosts. If you want VMs to be monitored for failure along with hosts, you have option for VM monitoring where HA will monitor the VMs using vmware tools and restart the VM on same host if VM fails.

Regards,

Suresh

Regards,
Suresh
https://vconnectit.wordpress.com/
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RajeevVCP4
Expert
Expert

Can you please elaborate your question.

What out put you want

What is your vision/requirement.

Rajeev Chauhan
VCIX-DCV6.5/VSAN/VXRAIL
Please mark help full or correct if my answer is use full for you
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hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

If the first host failed then what happened to the VM that moved to second host?

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sachu2017
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

To enable HA on cluster , At least two ESXi host should be present in that cluster.

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hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

If failed machine is a file server with 500 GB HDD then how much time need for move to new host?

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RajeevVCP4
Expert
Expert

Only resource move (CPU/Memory/and virtual machine files) storage will not come in picture at the time of failing host. But your all data storage should be shared among the host in the cluster.

Rajeev Chauhan
VCIX-DCV6.5/VSAN/VXRAIL
Please mark help full or correct if my answer is use full for you
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hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Then how can I tell to the second ESXi my HDD?

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MDNaseer
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Datastore should be on shared storage for HA to work. 

Its something like power off the VM one of esx host and power it on another ESX host that all..

VMDK/ Disk are going to copy / move.

hack3rcon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Something like SAN or NAS? Thus, When I want to create a machine then I should select NAS or SAN as storage?

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