Multiple virtual switches using 1 vmnic

[yliu9]

Hi all,

I probably should know this, but you guys all probably knows what "tests" you can do in an all-production environment...

We all know that for redundancy, you can connect multiple physical nics to vswitches, however, the twist - can you have mulitiple virtual switches connected to a single physical NIC?

[gary1012 · Accepted solution]

No, a single pNIC (vmnicX) cannot be assigned to multiple vSwitches.

[Gerrit_Lehr]

No that is not possible. You can select an adapter that is allready connected to another switch, but this will remove it from the other switch. A physical NIC can only be uplink for one vSwitch.

Kind Regards,

Gerrit Lehr

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

[weinstein5]

I will add my voice to the chorus - no you cannot connect a single physical nic to multiple virtual switches -

[yliu9]

Thanks guys

Just re-confirmed my thought

Cheers

[Texiwill]

Hello,

While it is not possible to have more than 1 vSwitch per pNIC it is possible to have quite a few portgroups per vSwitch. This portgroups will behave just like VLANs if you define things properly. Thereby you can make a vSwitch act like multiple vSwitches. I use this for some internal vNetworks and testing.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization