Hi,
What NSX components do you need to deploy if you just want to use the Load Balancing feature? Do you need to deploy NSX Controllers and install NSX Vibs on the hosts, or can you go straight to the Edge Gateway appliance deployment? Thanks.
While you can deploy an NSX Edge without NSX Controller Cluster, you would still need to prepare the ESXi host/cluster for NSX and technically installing VIBs into it.
This is also mentioned in the admin guide here: Add an Edge Services Gateway
If the cluster is not prepared for NSX, you will get below error message
No VIBs on the underlying host are required for Edge communication as it has its own message bus (VIX). The edge communicates directly with the NSX manager so if you'll be using it to load balance to/from VLAN backed port groups (so no VXLAN) then you wouldn't need controllers either. There's a brief write up on how this works in the NSX Manager and Edge Communication Issuesdoc too.
While you can deploy an NSX Edge without NSX Controller Cluster, you would still need to prepare the ESXi host/cluster for NSX and technically installing VIBs into it.
This is also mentioned in the admin guide here: Add an Edge Services Gateway
If the cluster is not prepared for NSX, you will get below error message