Auto VMotion on server failure

[adambird]

I have 3 servers in a test enviroment, I would like to configure these to auto vmotion on a hardware failure:

example:

Server1: hosts 3VMs

Server2: hosts 5VMs

Server3: hosts 2VMs

if say Server1 failed I would like Server2 & Server3 to take over the VMs from Server1.

does this require the enterprise version? or would the advanced version be adequate? I believe to do this you need the distributed switch which would point to the version I require to be enterprise plus. could someone confirm this please?

Also can this be done with HA? I guess this would have a memory requirement on all ESX servers that are hosting HA VMs.

Or is there a script that can be run to check if a server is alive from say the vcentre server and migrate to another ESX in the event of a physical server failure?

thankyou in advance.

[athlon_crazy · Accepted solution]

1. You need VMware HA instead vMotion for hardware failure a.k.a unplan shutdown

2. VMware HA required proper vCenter license depend on your ESX refer Here

3. VMware HA doesn't need dvSwitch at all and legacy switch is enough

4. Once configured VMware HA, vCenter & ESX itself will do everything for you inclusive heartbeat check

vcbMC-1.0.6 Beta

vcbMC-1.0.7 Lite

http://www.no-x.org

[adambird]

with HA am I correct that a VM will use memory from all ESX servers that host the VM under HA?

[athlon_crazy]

I'm not sure what do you mean by "VM will use memory from all ESX". My understanding is, once ESX involved in HA cluster, all ESX memory for Virtual Machine become a pool to the cluster and available to all VMs configured under VMware HA.

vcbMC-1.0.6 Beta

vcbMC-1.0.7 Lite

http://www.no-x.org

[JimKnopf99]

not realy. A VM is, instead of Fault Tolerance, only able to run on one esx host. And therefor, the memory ist used only from that esx host where the vm is running.

The HA feature calculate with the highest memory and cpu reservation the possibility to turn on vm on esx host. Maybe you meen that. But you are never able to get the physical memory from two esx host on one vm.

Frank

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[TomHowarth]

there are two features of ESX that may help you with what you wish to do, the first is HA, has is High availability, however unlike a Microsoft Cluster when you lose a serrver the other takes over seamlessly, with VMware HA there is a 30 second of so delay until the system notices the loss of the server and restarts the guests on one of your other machines - also bear in mind that any restart will be crash consistent.

The second feature is FT or Fault Tolerance, here VMware runs a "Shadow VM" that is lockstepped with the active guest, this time when a host fails the running guest automatically fails over the the shadow guest running on the other server.

the first option does not require any memory, however the second option the guest will utilse memory and processor as if it is running on the server. also FT requires modern processors to be configured.

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Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert 2009/2010

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author on "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://www.amazon.co.uk/VMware-VSphere-Virtual-Infrastructure-Security/dp/0137158009/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256146240&sr=1-1]”.

Contributing author on "[VCP VMware Certified Professional on VSphere 4 Study Guide: Exam VCP-410|http://www.amazon.co.uk/VMware-Certified-Professional-VSphere-Study/dp/0470569611]”.