witness without stretched cluster

[Luca82]

Hi everyone. One of my customers is considering to buy an Horizon View infrastructure which includes the "VSAN advanced" license.

He has only 2 ESX hosts. He wants to expand the hosts into 2 different buildings, linked with a 10GB fibre channel.

The better solution is, obviously, to use stretched cluster with witness virtual appliance.....but stretched cluster requires the vSAN Enterprise license.

Now, is it possible to create a vSAN cluster (not stretched) with 2 physical node plus witness virtual appliance? Or are there any alternative way to meet the demands without upgrade the vSAN license?

Thank you!

[TheBobkin]

Hello Luca,

You can create and use a 2-data node (+ Witness) Stretched Cluster with a Standard vSAN license,

only 3 data-nodes or more require Enterprise vSAN license.

http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2017/01/24/two-host-stretched-vsan-cluster-with-standard-license/

Another alternative if you have a (relatively small number of VMs) would be a ROBO cluster which only requires 1 vSAN ROBO license per cluster (not per host) of 25 VMs:

https://blogs.vmware.com/virtualblocks/2015/09/11/vmware-virtual-san-robo-edition/

Bob

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[Luca82]

WOW... therefore it seems to be possible....but not certified by vmware! Isn't it?

The problem is that I am selling the solution.....therefore I don't want to sell the standard license if vmware says that it is not possible to make stretched cluster (even if it works...) in order to avoid future problem....

Is there somewhere a vmware document wich says that is it possible to make stretched with standard license?

[TheBobkin · Accepted solution]

Hello Luca,

As depping points out in his article, in the EULA under the Licensing section for vSAN Standard Edition License (p16-17) it states that this can be done and thus is considered 'supported':

"A Cluster containing exactly two Servers, commonly referred to as a 2-node Cluster, can be deployed as a Stretched Cluster"

Note aswell that Witness Appliances are not really considered 'nodes' as such in this description (can't really have a 2-node stretched without a Witness!)

Link to the Product Guide:

http://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/product/vmware-product-guide.pdf

There may be additional license limitations (number of concurrent VMs/users) when using this for a View environment as 'vSAN for Desktop' type licenses are implied, maybe contact our sales team for more information regarding this aspect.

Bob

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[Jasemccarty]

Hello,

I maintain the Stretched Cluster & 2 Node guide on StorageHub.vmware.com, and receive questions like this often. 

2 Node is generally considered in the same rack or same building. Across buildings is essentially the "spirit" of a Stretched Cluster & would probably be considered to be a 1+1+1 Stretched Cluster. 

[Luca82]

This is definitively the answer to my question. Thank you very much for everything!