vLan Tagging with HP Vialrtual Connect Flex-10

[leduke]

Hello.

I'm looking for the technical specs wich can show how many vLan can accept the Virtual Connect Flex-10.

I have to map about 200 vLans (and maybe more...) to virtual machines port groups.

I wonder If the flex-10 can map into a flex-nic 200 vLans...

If i's not possible, I will create a port group with vLan ID 4095 and tag vLans into virtual machines....

Thank you.

[logiboy123]

I would recommend reading the following document from HP;

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01608922/c01608922.pdf

On page 6 it states that if you need more the 128 VLANs on a single uplink set then you must use tunneling. So I suspect you probably can get 200 VLANs but you would need to configure your uplinks in a specific way. The best people to ask about this would be a representative from HP.

Regards,

Paul

[leduke]

Thank you for replying.

I sent an email to HP's infocenter , but no answer yet....

If I use tunneling, I have to use vLan ID 4095 on my port group, so I have to create only one port group for all my virtual machines. But with 200 vLan is the Vmkernel or Serice Console will be be too much solicited ?

I wonder if the tunneling Mode on Flex-10 is compatible with "Trunk" mode on Cisco...

Thank you.

[slaclair]

I'm not sure about breaking the 128 VLAN limit but for each interface in Virtual Connect I assign multiple VLANs to each interface to treat them as trunk ports... then within vSphere I just make sure I don't have any port groups that aren't defined.

Since the web management can be slow you can execute multiple commands via vCLI and just separate each command by a comma and they'll run on their own.... so lets say there is a profile named "bay 1" which is assigned to blade #1 followed by a colon that points to the port ID (which we'll say is #3) and a network called "SideA" attached to the proper uplink port to ensure reduncancy

>add server-port-map bay1:3 SideA vlanID=105,  add server-port-map bay1:3 SideA vlanID=999

Per my configuration I have dedicated ports on different uplinks for management traffic (on separate LOM's of course), then the other ports for "multiple networks" which have all of the VLAN's defined in VC

[leduke]

If I choose to use vLan Tunneling in Virtual Connect.

How is it defined to networks Tabs, How is it mapped to the flex-Nic (it's not Multiple network ?) ?

I will appreciate to have screenshot of this, if possible or a white paper by HP.

In vmware on my Port Group, must I use vLan ID 4095, or I can créate one port group by vLan if the uplink port of the VC is in Tunneled mode ?

Thank you very much.

[slaclair]

Unfortunately I can't provide screen captures as my environment is on a closed network.

The Virtual Connect Ether Cookbook was vital to configuring this

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01990371/c01990371.pdf

Within Virtual Connect manager I created a Ethernet Network for each VLAN that was going to be used and linked to a shared uplink set

Then I created a server profile for each bay, and made a new port and instead of defining a single network you choose the "multiple networks" option and then add mappings for all of the networks created in the previous set.

I wish I could provide a screenshot because it is MUCH easier if you could see it than explaining it.

[leduke]

I will take a look on this document.

The parameters you discribe need to define all vLans in "Ethernet Networks" tab, in Shared Uplink Set, you have to select all "Ethernet Networks" you want to communicate with this uplink (external network). After this, in each server profile, for LOM:1-a you select "Multiple Networks" and add choose between the "Ethernet Networks" you defined.

My problem is: You can only define 128 "Ethernet Networks". Second problem on server profile, when you choose "Multiple Networks" you can add only 28 "Ethernet Networks" you defined before...

So, me on LOM:1-a, for exemple, I need 200 vLans.... :smileyconfused:

[slaclair]

Well per product limitation you're not going to be able to have 200 per LOM:1-a

You could have 8 ports total between both LOM's, but you're forced to break up each of your 10Gb connections between each.  Given this 200 vlan requirement it sounds messy at best... perhaps somebody that found a way to overcome this limitation will chime in.

[leduke]

According to this document:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01386629/c01386629.pdf

In page 19 to 21, it seems to be better tu use "VLAN Tunneling Mode" in my case.... But I don't know how to use it, I alway use SUS....

Is some one used it ?

Thank you.