Objective 5.2 – Configure VXLAN

Knowledge

• Identify where to install and configure VXLAN
  • VXLAN is installed and configured on all ESXi hosts that need to communicate within a Transport Zone.
  • Not normally installed/configured on hosts that are just part of the management cluster
• Identify physical network requirements
  • Physical infrastructure MTU is at least 50 bytes more than the MTU of the virtual machine vNIC.
  • DHCP is available on VXLAN transport VLANs if you are using DHCP for IP assignment for VMKNics
  • 5- tuple hash distribution should be enabled for Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP).
  • VXLAN traffic should be placed on a separate VLAN from other traffic (Mgmt, vMotion etc)
• Prepare a cluster for VXLAN
  • In the Installation tab, click Host Preparation.
  • For each cluster, click Install in the Installation Status column. NOTE While the installation is in progress, do not deploy, upgrade, or uninstall any service or component.
  • Monitor the installation till the Installation Status column displays a green check mark Three VIBs are installed and registered with all hosts within the prepared cluster – VXLAN, Distributed Firewall, and Logical Routing.
• Determine the appropriate teaming policy for a given implementation
  • You should choose a teaming policy for VXLAN transport based on the topology of your physical switches.
    
    For certain teaming modes, VMware software creates multiple VTEPs to load balance traffic between the physical vNICs.
• Add/Edit/Expand/Contract transport zones
  • See Objective 4.4
• Prepare VXLAN Tunnel End Points (VTEPs) on clusters
  • Navigate to the Installation > Host Preparation tab.
  • For the cluster on which you want to configure VXLAN, click Configure in the VXLAN column.
  • In the Configuring VXLAN networking dialog box, select the switch to which you want to map the cluster.
  • Type the VLAN transport.
  • Type the Maximum Transmission Units (MTU) for the virtual distributed switch.
  • MTU is the maximum amount of data that can be transmitted in one packet before it is divided into smaller packets. VXLAN traffic frames are slightly larger in size because of the encapsulation, so the MTU for each switch must be set to 1550 or higher.
  • In VMKNic IP Addressing, specify the IP pool to be used for the Management and Edge cluster. Use DHCP or IP pool.
  • If you selected Use IP Pool, select an IP pool
  • Select the VMKNic Teaming Policy for the vSwitch. The NIC teaming policy determines the load balancing and failover settings of the virtual switch.
  • Edit the VTEP value, if required. VTEP (VXLAN Tunnel End Points) is the number of dvUplinks on the switch, which load balances traffic between multiple PNICs. VMware recommends that you do not edit the default VTEP This field is disabled if the teaming policy you selected does not require multiple VTEPs (ether channel, failover, LACPv1, or LACPv2).
  • Click OK

Tools

• NSX Installation and Upgrade Guide
• NSX Administration Guide
• NSX Manager
• vSphere Web Client