management network, set on host or vcenter?

[bolddefender]

I've a few ESXi 4.1 hosts where the management network IP address set on the host is different from what is set in vcenter (host, configuration, networking, properties etc) . Should these be the same?

What I'm wondering is-

What is the IP address on the host for. Obviously you can download vmware client and also use this address to add it into vcenter. Does it have any other purpose?

[a_p_]

Not sure I understand this. All involved components - vCenter Server as well as the ESXi hosts - need their own network settings (IP address) in order to work in an IP network. Usually you will manage the ESXi hosts through vCenter Server, but it's also possible - if required - to connect to the hosts directly if you did not enable "Lockdown" mode..

André

[Gortee]

What I'm wondering is-

What is the IP address on the host for. Obviously you can download vmware client and also use this address to add it into vcenter. Does it have any other purpose?

-I think it may have already been answered but the Ip address on each host is for communication and control.  Vcenter uses this ip address to intitate actions and controll the host via the API that runs on this port.   In addition it can be used to directly controll the host.

I think the confusion can come from the four available networks involved in the process:

1. Management - For individual management and vcenter management

2. Vmotion - strictly for vmotion traffic

3. FT - strickly for Fault tolerance logging

4. Vm - For virtual machines

Any nic can carry all of these or a single it really depends on your setup.  For example if your Management contained number 1,2,3 then it's possible to see how you can wonder why we need a IP for all three...  different services run and require specific port bindings...

I hope this helps... let me know if you have additional questions.

Thanks

[bolddefender]

For more info - I've 2 clusters with 5 hosts each and I'm in the process of adding another host to each cluster. I didn't setup the original hosts or vcenter.

So I guess my main question is. Should the address set directly on the host (1st pic) be the same or different from the address set in vcenter (2nd pic).

[a_p_]

Are you saying the GUI shows another IP address than the DCUI? I've never seen anything like this.

Can you confirm that the host has only a single Management Network configured?

André

[bolddefender]

Yes different address in most of the hosts compared to vcenter.

Also only single management network configured.

[Gortee]

Since your running 4.1 here are a few pointers. 

dc1-esx should resolve to the same ip address as the two blued out sections unless you have multiple management networks.  If these are not the same I am not sure how a lot of the communications work.  Without seeing a full picture of your networking on each host it would be impossible to really figure this out.  But simple answer is they should be the same as the DNS resolution which is pretty critical in 4.1

[lenzker]

Have you used host profiles to configure the esxi hosts?

[bolddefender]

OK, DNS resolved the address set in vcenter. These are manaual entries in DNS so thats as expected.

I've only one management network

[bolddefender]

There are no host profiles configured now but I think when we upgraded to ESXi from 3.5 host profiles may have been used.

[bolddefender]

The earlier pings I did were from my windows machine. From a couple of hosts I tried to ping all 10 hosts by name, they all resolved each other with the correct IP (from VCenter) and responded to pings. Apart from when I ping the local host themselevs, they then resolved to the address set on the host.

[Gortee]

Are you sure none of those other networks have management traffic enabled like the vmotion?  

Are all your hosts esxi?

[bolddefender]

No they are all virtual machine networks apart from two vmkernel networks, one for  management and one for vmotion.

[Gortee]

This is a really odd one... you may want to consider removing the hosts from vcenter and re-adding them.  

You can do the following process:

1. Disconnect

2. Remove host

3. Re-add host

4. See if problem goes away

This process will cause your vm's to loose resource pool and rules so you will want to migrate all the vm's off the host before you do this process.

Give it a try and see if it fixes the issue.