Change IP Address of vSAN Hosts

[Evan5]

Hi - I have to move my entire environment to a new network and change all my IP addresses for everything on my network.

I am at the stage where I need to change the VSAN environment.

Rather than change the vCenter IP address I have decided to create a new vCenter machine (windows based) which will have the new IP and then move the vSAN hosts to that vCenter.

From my research it seems fairly simple to move a vSAN cluster between vCenters which is good to know and I'm using Standard Switches which is easier to move than DvS, however I also need to change the IP management addresses of each host so I am looking for advice as to any problems you can foresee?

My plan is to do the following.

• Remove all 4 hosts from old vCenter
• Change Management IP on each host.
• Update DNS
• Make sure to flush DNS on new vCenter windows box and check they are resolving new IPs via hostname
• Add each Host into new vCenter
• Create new vSAN cluster, enable vSAN on Cluster
• Move each host one by one into new vSAN cluster
• Hopefully watch all error messages disappear.

Can you see anything wrong with that approach? I don't envision that changing the management IP address on each host will affect vSAN but still worry about it. I cant find any info on anyone ever changing their vSAN management host IPs. Lots of ESXi IP changes but not when part of vSAN.

My vSAN network itself is a separate network using separate NICs and switches so it shouldn't really make a difference, right?

[zdickinson]

Good afternoon, here is a good guide on how to move vSAN from one vCenter to another:  http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2014/09/how-to-move-a-vsan-cluster-from-one-vcenter-server-to-another...

As for the re-IP of the management interfaces.  I THINK you will be OK.  With vSAN enabled the host should use the vSAN network to do HA heartbeating, so HA shouldn't kick in.  Just to be safe I would probably move them to the new vCenter and then re-IP them one at a time while in maintenance mode.

Thank  you, Zach.

[Evan5]

Hi Zach - thanks for taking the time to assist with this. That link to William Lam's blog is exactly the one I have been studying while planning this move too.

I hadn't really considered the option of changing the ESXi management IP address after the move to the new vCenter and also while in maintenance mode. I think that has a lot of merit to it.

There is a good chance (and probably best practice) I will need to remove it from vCenter and re-add it again during the change of host IP process, but hopefully adding it back into the new existing vCenter vSAN cluster is less risky than changing IP and adding to new vCenter in one go.

[zdickinson]

Good morning, it depends on how you add the hosts in the first place.  If you add them by IP, then yes you will have to remove and re-add.  If you add them by name, you should be able to do maintenance mode, disconnect (not remove), change the IP, make sure vCenter is resolving the new IP, and then re-connect.  Thank you, Zach.