With little VMware experiance I got assigned the task of trying to see why one of our VLANs is not working on one of our ESXi 5.0 servers. I will try to be as descriptive as possible.
The issue just started after working fine for months, when this first started to startup and running config had not been updated for several weeks on the router and switch.
Our server has 4 physical NICS 0 1 2 3
0 and 1 are teamed together on VLAN1 and are also used for the management network
NIC 2 is used for VLAN 111 (network our wireless users connect to so they cant interact with VLAN1)
NIC 3 is connected to VLAN 66 (a network for video and deployment services)
These 4 physical NICs are connected to three different vswitches as follows (I am not the one who set these up so don't ask why they are like they are)
vSwitch0 has vmnic0 and vmnic1
vSwitch1 has vmnic3
vSwitch2 has vmnic2
All these ports are connected physically to a Dell PowerConnect 5548 switch
vmnic0 to:
interface gigabitethernet1/0/24
description "VM Server 1"
switchport mode general
switchport general allowed vlan add 111 tagged
switchport general allowed vlan add 1 untagged
switchport general forbidden vlan add 5,66,98
vmnic1 to:
interface gigabitethernet1/0/17
description "VM Server 2"
switchport mode general
switchport general allowed vlan add 111 tagged
switchport general allowed vlan add 1 untagged
switchport general forbidden vlan add 5,66,98
vmnic2 to:
interface gigabitethernet1/0/6
description "VM Server 3"
switchport general allowed vlan add 111 tagged
switchport general allowed vlan add 1 untagged
switchport general forbidden vlan add 5,66,98
switchport access vlan 111 (Have tried many different configurations on this port including Trunk with 1 untagged and 111 tagged as VLAN 1 and 111 come through from the router on the same port. Also just a basic switchport mode access vlan 111)
vmnic3 to:
interface gigabitethernet1/0/43
description "VM Server 4"
switchport access vlan 66
If I plug a laptop into int gi 1/0/6 I get an IP address from DHCP and can get online. When i go into vSwitch2 properties and go to VMKernel and try to set it to obtain an IP address automatically I get a 169.254*.* address. If I statically set the address to one I know is available there still is no connection. I will add more information later if needed, I have a meeting to get to in regards to another project. Anyone that can help, thank you ahead of time. If you have specific information needed, I will respond ASAP.
On the configuration page under network adapters vmnic2 does not have any observed IP ranges and I am not sure how to edit the nic to maybe add the addresses
No problem, please mark correct and helpfull answers to help others in the future.
Good luck with Dell!
Are all the NICs integrated? You can always add a PCI nic if there are slots. I have not looked at how your hardware is configured.
Yeah, all NICs are soldered to the motherboard. I will check later to see if there are expansion slots inside.
I don´t know what licence type you have but from the attached image you post it would be far more easy to manage this from a distributed switch.
From what i see you can destiny 1 of the 4 adapters to create a DVS, create DVPG with different VLANs and course all the traffic from other standard switches to that new DVS (at first avoid ACLs).
If you have the licence its one day work and for your implementation it would suit better to team up everything and allow the hypervisor lo balance the network load. When you migrate the 3 working network cards you can address your attention to the interface with problems without disrupting network access to the services.
Hope this helps.
I will give that a try next week.
For now Dell has a courier bringing me a new daughter card today and will be installing it around 5pm when everyone goes home. Hope this works then will read more into the distributed VS.
Have you got enterprise plus licensing? Otherwise the DvS isn't supported.
