Compare Network Configuration on Multiple ESX servers

[jjbova]

Hey all, we are running ESX 3.5 with vCenter 2.5. I thought I had everything set up right, but Ikeep running into an Error with configuring HA and moving Machines to one of my 4 ESX servers. The problem apears to be somewhere in the Networking portion. I am digging through logs and flipping between the configurations, and know I will figure it out. My question is..... is there an easier way to compair all the esx servers network settings to find the differences or is it just a matter of going between the tabs until you find something wrong?

[mnasir · Accepted solution]

jjbova,

You meant esx 3 Update 4 Build 153875 not Esx 3 Update 5 right? VMware engineers thought about your problem and came up with a really cool solution “ vNetwork Distributed Switch - ” but unfortunately that feature is only available on vSphere 4 (ESX 4). On ESX 3.x there are two ways you can compare your network settings between ESX hosts –

Using VIC client: Rather than browsing multiple tabs, I would recommend opening multiple sessions to the vCenter server - this way you can compare network configurations of multiple hosts simultaneously. And, if you are lucky to have two monitors than it even works better.

Using Command line: You can use “esxcfg-vswitch - l” this command from the console, this gives you a list of all virtual switches and their port-groups configurations on the screen. You can print that out and cross reference it with your other hosts within the same cluster.

Please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful", if you find this post useful. Thanks!!

[jjbova]

The command from the console helped. My problem was different port numbers on one of the vSwitches. We are actually already looking into upgrading to the new Cisco Blade servers with ESX 4. But until then, thank you for the help.

[mnasir]

I am glad that I was able to help you. Happy Virtualization!!

Please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "helpful", if you find this post useful. Thanks!!

Thanks,

Meraz Nasir

[JDLangdon]

The easiest way to resovle networking issues related to HA, DRS, and VMotion are to download and run vWire's OpsCheck.

________________________________

Jason D. Langdon