I am trying to get some information in regards to the functionality of the tick boxes on the VMKernel adapters network connections settings.
I found an interesting post from Duncan which states,
"The feature described as “Management traffic” does nothing more than enabling that VMkernel NIC for HA heartbeat traffic. Yes that is it. Even if you disable this feature, management traffic, you can still use the VMkernel’s associated IP address for adding it to vCenter Server. You can still SSH that VMkernel associated IP address if you have SSH enabled. So keep that in mind."
Ok this makes sense, however I am trying to validate a few configs in the lab, spinning this up now.
Basically I have two VMK nics, both on the same subnet. One is ticked for management traffic and the other is ticked for vmotion. So basically from what I read from Duncan I can still hit the management IP on either VMK if one of the VMK nics is down (seeing as they are in the same subnet)? Also does this tick box work the same for vmotion traffic as they are in the same S/N. IE: if the vMotion enabled VMK goes down, can vMotion traffic succeed out of the other VMK ticked for management traffic?
I think the answer is yes, as if the VMK1 is down, it will default out the first VMKernel NIC for vMotion traffic if in the same subnet per FrankD. However this appears far from best practice. Basically VMK0 ticked for management and VMK1 ticked for vMotion and both are in the same subnet.
Why is vMotion using the management network instead of the vMotion network? - frankdenneman.nl
Once again, I am going to lab this, I just need to spin up my resources this weekend, any assistance would be greatly appreciated!
