Solved: Virtual Center Multiple Datacenters Question

apc_dwallace · ‎10-09-2008

Hello,

Currently we are running a ESX enviroment ina physical datacenter. We recently aquired another company that is running ESX in their enviroment. We have a 9M fractional DS-3 between the two sites. Is it possible to disconnect all their ESX servers and abandon thier Virtual Center, and connect them into ours? I believe it would be, but just looking for confirmation. I am assuming that nothing will need to be changed in terms of networking, storage, etc, because the ESX servers and storage are still staying local to that location. I am looking to centrally manage all ESX servers and control with permissions within VC, rather than have to remember multiple VC user/password.

Also, What are some pros/cons to do this so I can take back to management.

Hopefully someone will correct me if I am wrong

azn2kew · ‎10-09-2008

Centralize VC administration model should be great since you're the primary engineers to manage all ESX environment. Unless you trust them and in need to keep VC in a seperate location such as politics then no choice there. You should be able to disconnect and remove all ESX hosts from that VC server gracefully and VMs still functional as is. You would have to make sure networking is communicate via standard VC/ESX traffic via firewall. If you can get traffic through from site B to site A then that's all it takes. You can then create seperate folders/datacenters/resource pools and assign their IT group folks to exclusively with certain permissions you allow to manage their objects. You can also enable web access administration as well if you have SSL enable for security purpose but they can't do any ESX configurations rather than general guest machines provisioning.

Pros is that you safe extra $ for VC license and database server remotely. You dont' have to pay extra staff for administering those boxes as well. Provides better administration and control over your ESX environment. Cons is that there is a single point of failure, but you can manage to architect standby or P2V'ed version of VC server in case or dump it on a virtual machine as well.

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

Regards,

Stefan Nguyen

iGeek Systems Inc.

VMware, Citrix, Microsoft Consultant

If you found this information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful". Thanks!!! Regards, Stefan Nguyen VMware vExpert 2009 iGeek Systems Inc. VMware vExpert, VCP 3 & 4, VSP, VTSP, CCA, CCEA, CCNA, MCSA, EMCSE, EMCISA

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chill · ‎10-09-2008

Yes this is possible. Just remove the hosts from the existing Virtual Centre and connect them into your Virtual Centre. Ensure that your license file is up to date including their licenses so that you have enough virtual centre agent licenses for all of them.

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If you find this information helpful or correct, please consider awarding points.

azn2kew · ‎10-09-2008

Centralize VC administration model should be great since you're the primary engineers to manage all ESX environment. Unless you trust them and in need to keep VC in a seperate location such as politics then no choice there. You should be able to disconnect and remove all ESX hosts from that VC server gracefully and VMs still functional as is. You would have to make sure networking is communicate via standard VC/ESX traffic via firewall. If you can get traffic through from site B to site A then that's all it takes. You can then create seperate folders/datacenters/resource pools and assign their IT group folks to exclusively with certain permissions you allow to manage their objects. You can also enable web access administration as well if you have SSL enable for security purpose but they can't do any ESX configurations rather than general guest machines provisioning.