Test Lab thoughts

[bwilsey84]

I was going to start building a test lab with ESXi 5.5. If I only have a single machine to run this on would it be wise to use VM Workstation? If i install ESXi 5.5 onto a single machine and turn it into a bare metal hypervisor how would I manage it without the use of an administrative client on another workstation. Unfortunately my home doesn't have much space which is why I will likely be limited to one machine. Im completley new to installing VSphere components. We have this same issue at work with a Bare Metal Hypervisor that can't be put onto our network.

[conyards]

Installing ESXi in VMware Workstation, is a a good way to get started. In fact VMware have a guide to show you exactly how to do it.

Installing ESXi 5.x or 6.x in VMware Workstation (2034803) | VMware KB

Thanks

Simon

[bwilsey84]

Thats kinda what I thought would be the best bet, that way I could admin it from the same box. However our work lab we setup is bare-metal with ESXi 5.5 already installed. This would likely be a preferred test since our work enviroment will definitely be using bare-metal and not a type II hypervisor.

Are we kinda screwed when it comes to trying to admin that Host without a network? This was going to be specifically for playing around with / low budget and overhead because it wouldn't be on our production network.

[conyards]

If you only have one server available, no external networking connectivity and no additional workstations that can connect to it, then I would suggest that your best bet is to use workstation.

If your main aim is to gain product familiarity, explore a few features and run through the deployment process of the hypervisor and VMs, then this should work quite nicely for you.  If you're main aim is performance testing, then this isn't going to be the best way.

Simon

[bwilsey84]

I might be able to snag an old workstation but that doesn't help with the no external networking. Could I connect directly to an ESXi bare-metal host. Or is the only way via a client that uses a network.

IE, If i setup a dumb switch and connect the prospective admin workstation and host to it, would they be able to talk that way even if there's no uplink/outside network. Or would a full on network be required.

Thank you for all your help

[conyards]

If you where able to snag an old switch and put the workstation on the same LAN then that should work to communicate to the host just fine.

Have you checked that the hardware you're going to deploy to will support ESXi?

VMware Compatibility Guide - System Search

One of the advantages that we've not discussed about the workstation route is that, because you are abstracted from the hardware you won't hit any annoying hardware compatibility issues.

What hardware are you planning on using for the host?

Simon

[bwilsey84]

ESXi 5.5 is currently installed on a HP z840 tower CPU is a Xenon E5-2640 with 32GB of memory

[conyards]

Perfect, that hardware is on the compatibility list for 5.5 through to 6.0.

VMware Compatibility Guide - System Search

So if you could find a dumb switch and an old workstation, then you'll have connectivity and be good to go.

Simon

[bwilsey84]

Awesome! So is there anything special that has to be done to configure the management network when using a LAN? Sorry. Im basically brand new to installing VM's and networking. I was a sys ad and only had on the job training for it. Our Sys Ad team was completely removed from the network team for seperation of powers so we pretty much managed servers. Never IP'd them because we couldn't hold both keys if that makes any sense.

[conyards]

You're not going to need to do anything special in your configuration.  If you are going to add vCentre or other services down the road then you'll need to think about DNS (yes that's bold and underlined, because it is that important to a vSphere environment as it grows).  However, for a single host you don't really need to worry about that.

You said that the host was already installed, so presumably it's been assigned an IP address and subnet already?  if not you can follow the documentation Configuring IP Settings for ESXi​.  You would then need to configure the workstation on the same static network.

For example if your host was configured on 192.168.0.1 with a subnet of 255.255.255.0 then configure the workstation on 192.168.0.2 with the same subnet.  As the devices will be communicating in the same subnet, you don't need to worry about a default gateway.

There are lots of good 'home lab' resources and discussions on the web that you can draw upon as you build this out.

Simon

[bwilsey84]

You've been extremley helpful! I figured all that was needed was the same subnet, since the host and client workstation wont be attached to anything but each other with the dumb switch. DNS wont be used for now especially since these machines can't touch our work network, but I will keep it in mind for the home lab!

[bwilsey84]

No luck so far! I tried putting the ESXi with the same config as you mentioned and same subnet as the workstation. Found a dumb hub but still can't get to the host at all. I didn't bother to try with https://<hostname>/ since DNS is out of the picture but http://192.168.0.1/ isn't reachable. I guess it could possibly be the hub but im less convinced its the hardware than it is my noviceness.

[conyards · Accepted solution]

You could do some quick testing.  Can you ping the ESX host from your workstation can you SSH (Putty tcp 22) from the workstation, can you ping your workstation from the ESXi host.  Do you have IPv6 enabled on the workstation?

Do you have multiple NICs in the back of the ESXi host?  Are you sure that the Nic associated with the MGMT interface is connected?

Thanks

Simon

[bwilsey84]

I do have multiple NIC's on the host, but it turns out it was the hub. I reset it a few times and finally was able to ping the host. Im working on deploying my first VM right now! Thank you again!