Current VM network - vs - Best practice

[iTravel]

Hello all,

I have inherited a 6 Cluster, with 60 ESX hosts VM Data Center.

We have 6 VLANs , spread into 2 vSwitches on 6 VMNics total.

At the moment vMotion is very slow (emptying a 25 VMs ESX can take up to an hour) and its clearly since it does not have its own VMnic.

My main question is:

currently i have this:

vSwitch0 -> 3 VMNics -> VLAN 10,20,30 -> Management Network -> vMotion

vSwitch1 -> 3 VMNics -> VLAN 40,50,60

All VMnics are active.

All VMnics are 1GB/s

The way i want it to be is:

vSwitch0 -> 4 VMNics all Active -> 6 Production VLANs using Port Groups

vSwitch1 -> 2 VMnics -> Management and vMotion (either both Active or Active\Standby)

Will that be a good scenario ?

Also, is there any reason to use "standby" instead of making all 4 VMnics Active ?

All VMnics are 1GB/s

Added is a picture of one ESX's network for 1 month - it tops at ~56000 KBps

[rcporto]

If you're worried about the vMotion performance, you may need take a look at Multi NIC vMotion feature, that will enhance your vMotion experience 🙂

Take a look:

VMware KB: Multiple-NIC vMotion in vSphere 5

[iTravel]

Thank you, it is already setup that way.

i am more interested in the scenario i have created and wanted to know if it would be better if any way

by the "best practice" PDF's i read - that is the most recommended way

[rcporto]

I prefer the scenario with vSwitch0 (MGMT/vMotion traffic) with 2 uplinks and Switch1 (VM traffic) with 4 uplinks. And let all vmnics active, except for the vMotion port group, that need to be active/standby.

[iTravel]

Thank you