Virtual Networks on ESX 6.7

[and_h]

Hi everyone,

I recently installed ESX 6.7 in a lab on an Intel NUC with one NIC built-in and added a separate NIC by installing a USB-C NIC adapter. Both NICs are connect to a single switch and (successfully) receive their internal IP addresses via DHCP. The USB NIC is used for management, while the "real" NIC will then be used for the production network traffic (DMZ, once I have set everything up).

Now, I have created two virtual NICs (one for each real NIC), two virtual switches (again, one for each) and two port groups (all with vlan 0) and connected them so that I ideally would have two separate TCP/IP stacks - one for production use and one for management only. However, I cannot add network adapters to virtual machines (dropdown is blank) and on the dashboard page, the section "Networks" is empty...can anyone tell me how to configure this correctly?

Many thanks,

Andreas

[T180985]

It sounds like you need to create some port groups. See: https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/6.7/com.vmware.vsphere.networking.doc/GUID-0BBDC715-2F93-4...

[Alex_Romeo]

Hi,

Did you both create them of type "vmkernel"? because this mode is not seen as a network to be assigned to vm.

ARomeo

[and_h]

Thanks, they actually are...how can I change that?

Best,

Andreas

[jburen]

I don't think you need a vmkernel interface on the switch you are going to use for VM traffic. It's just a port group for VMs. So you would end up with a vswitch (with vmkernel) connected to the USB nic for management and a second vswitch without a vmkernel port but only with a port group for VM traffic.

[T180985]

https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/6.7/com.vmware.vsphere.networking.doc/GUID-004E2D69-1EE8-4...

Procedure

1. In the vSphere Web Client, navigate to the host.
2. Right-click the host and select Add Networking.
3. In Select connection type, select Virtual Machine Port Group for a Standard Switch and click Next.
4. In Select target device, select an existing standard switch or create a new standard switch.
5. If the new port group is for an existing standard switch, navigate to the switch.      
   1. Click Browse.
   2. Select a standard switch from the list and click OK.
   3. Click Next and go to 7.
6. (Optional) Оn the Create a Standard Switch page, assign physical network adapters to the standard switch.       You can create a standard switch with or without adapters. If you create a standard switch without physical network adapters, all traffic on that switch is confined to that switch. No other hosts on the physical network or virtual machines on other standard switches can send or receive traffic over this standard switch. You might create a standard switch without physical network adapters if you want a group of virtual machines to be able to communicate with each other, but not with other hosts or with virtual machines outside the group.
   1. Click Add adapters.
   2. Select an adapter from the Network Adapters list.
   3. Use the Failover order group drop-down menu to assign the adapter to Active adapters, Standby adapters, or Unused adapters, and click OK.
   4. (Optional) Use the up and down arrows in the Assigned adapters list to change the position of the adapter if needed.
   5. Click Next.
7. On the Connection settings page, identify traffic through the ports of the group.      
   1. Type a Network label for the port group, or accept the generated label.
   2. Set the VLAN ID to configure VLAN handling in the port group.         The VLAN ID also reflects the VLAN tagging mode in the port group.

      VLAN Tagging Mode	VLAN ID	Description
      External Switch Tagging (EST)	0	The virtual switch does not pass traffic associated with a VLAN.
      Virtual Switch Tagging (VST)	From 1 to 4094	The virtual switch tags traffic with the entered tag.
      Virtual Guest Tagging (VGT)	4095	Virtual machines handle VLANs. The virtual switch passes traffic from any VLAN.

   3. Click Next.
8. Review the port group settings in the Ready to complete page, and click Finish.

[Alex_Romeo]

Hi,

I imagined...that's why you don't see the net.
If you wish, you can unhook the network card of the vmkernel that you don't need and create another VDS or VSS and hook the physical network card that you have unhooked. Then create at least one group of doors and you will see that you can hook the virtual machine in "edit Settings"

or follow this procedure:

• Migrate a VMkernel Adapter on a Host to a vSphere Standard Switch
• http://vcdx56.com/2019/04/migrate-esxi-vmkernel-port-group-to-a-vsphere-standard-switch/

ARomeo

P.S. I prefer the method of unhooking the physical network card and creating a new VSS \ VDS with that network card (attention only to unhook the correct vmkernel).