VMware Horizon Community
thafemann
Contributor
Contributor

Getting Started Questions

Hello All,

I am getting started with my second install of Horizon View ever.  The first time I had a vendor do most of it for me and hand it off, but I don't know if it was configured correctly from setup.  Here is my question about configuration.

I have 6 physical servers.  3 of them are dedicated for vsphere 6.5 datacenter.  They are located inside a cluster and everything is working just fine.  The other 3 servers are going to be a part of a VDI-vCenter.

Do I build a completely separate VDI-vCenter, where I install vcenter into its own cluster outside of the datacenter, or do I put the VDI-vCenter appliance and the connection servers inside of the datacenter and let the datacenter manage those servers so that all the resources for vdi are allocated on those 3 VDI servers?

I have been looking for a GOOD configuration/design guide and can not find one for sure.  Any help with this will be appreciated.  I am working on this to get my VCP7-DTM.

TIA

Tom

6 Replies
jrodsguitar
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

So I like to keep my infrastructure vCeneter separate from my Horizon vCenter.

If I'm recomposing a pool of 1000 linked clones I don't want that to affect or even show up in the infrastructure vCenter. I like to keep things separate and not mix it all up. Just my 2 cents.

Blog: https://powershell.house/
Reply
0 Kudos
thafemann
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for sharing.  Do you at least put vCenter for VDI in your Datacenter?  I can see putting the servers that recompose in the VDI cluster.  Where do you put the connection servers?

Tom

Reply
0 Kudos
jrodsguitar
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

So I treat Connection Servers, Composer Servers, UAG's, and Horizon vCenter as infrastructure. The only things running on my Horizon vSphere are the client machines that users connect to. This is really just one way to do it but again, I like to keep my user VDI workstations completely separate from everything else.

Excuse the crudity of this mini diagram:

Infrastructure vSphere

            Infrastructure dataCenter:

                    Infrastructure VM Host Cluster (x amount of VM hosts)

                              infrastructure vCenter servers

                              Horizon vCenter servers (Horizon vSphere)

                              Horizon Connection Servers

                              Horizon Composer Servers

                              Horizon UAG's

Horizon vSphere

             Horizon dataCenter

                       Horizon VM Host Cluster (3 VM hosts)

                              Gold Image

                              Pool Parent Machines

                              Win7-VDI-001

                              Win7-VDI-002

                              Win7-VDI-003

Blog: https://powershell.house/
BenFB
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

jrodsguitar​ I couldn't agree more. This is exactly how we designed our environment. It sounds like LiaoYuRuei​ has a pretty small environment so this may not apply. As things grow I would recommend a management vCenter.

Reply
0 Kudos
thafemann
Contributor
Contributor

Thank you for the great explanation.  May I ask a few more questions?  I have 3 physical servers to work with for now and I want to dedicate them to the VDI guest environment.

Infrastructure vSphere

            Infrastructure dataCenter:

                    Infrastructure VM Host Cluster (x amount of VM hosts) (because you have created another cluster, you have ESXi hosts dedicated JUST TO these servers in this cluster  How many servers do you use to run this?  But could I start out with these servers in my normal datacenter and create a resource pool?  And once I get more traction to VDI, buy more hosts, create a new cluster, migrate these machines to a new cluster?)

                              infrastructure vCenter servers

                              Horizon vCenter servers (Horizon vSphere)

                              Horizon Connection Servers

                              Horizon Composer Servers

                              Horizon UAG's

Horizon vSphere

             Horizon dataCenter

                       Horizon VM Host Cluster (3 VM hosts)  (I am fairly certain I understand this portion as this is where I spent a good deal of time other than using the composer)

                              Gold Image

                              Pool Parent Machines

                              Win7-VDI-001

                              Win7-VDI-002

                              Win7-VDI-003

I apologize that I wasn't too clear in my process.  I am studying for my VDI7-DTM exam and building a proof of concept environment.  I have 3 older, out of production hosts in which to try to make a few vdi hosts work.  I am expecting that after proof of concept roughly a 3 year migration to VDI.  We are still purchasing desktop computers and will probably not do a wholesale replacement.

I just do not want to start down a design and realize that OOPS....I should have.....and then have to rebuild.  I have already done a rebuild TWICE because it failed to launch.

Tom

Reply
0 Kudos
jrodsguitar
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

So if this is purely for POC I would say go ahead and use the older hosts you have. And yes you could just add them to your existing data center then break it out to it's own once you decide to go live.

I don't think you can go wrong either way as long as you correctly provision the storage and compute resources correctly. Now if you're running thousands and thousands of desktops, of course I recommend to break out to a separate vCenter, but again for a POC, keep it on same the datacenter you are using.

Blog: https://powershell.house/
Reply
0 Kudos