Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter 1.7 Reference Architecture

Dell Global Solutions Engineering

Revision: A00

March 2012

vStart 100 and 200 Hyper-V Reference

Architecture

Release 1.3 for Dell 12th generation servers

vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

This document is for informational purposes only and may contain typographical errors and
technical inaccuracies. The content is provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any
kind.

© 2012 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell and its affiliates cannot be responsible for errors or omissions
in typography or photography. Dell, the Dell logo, PowerConnect, EqualLogic, OpenManage, and
PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc. Intel and Xeon are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation in
the U.S. and other countries. Microsoft, Windows, Hyper-V, Active Directory, and Windows Server are
either trademarks or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other
countries. Intel and Active Directory are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation. Other trademarks
and trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and
names or their products. Dell disclaims proprietary interest in the marks and names of others.

March 2012| Rev A00

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vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

Contents

1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1

2 Audience............................................................................................................... 1

3 Solution Overview ................................................................................................... 2

3.1 Product Overview ............................................................................................. 4

3.1.1 PowerEdge R720 for Hyper-V Cluster ................................................................... 4

3.1.2 EqualLogic PS6100 for iSCSI Storage .................................................................... 4

3.1.3 PowerEdge R620 Management Server .................................................................. 5

3.1.4 PowerConnect 7048 or 6248 for LAN and SAN Traffic ............................................... 5

4 Design Principles ..................................................................................................... 7

4.1 No Single Point of Failure .................................................................................... 7

4.2 Physical Separation of LAN and iSCSI SAN Traffic ....................................................... 7

4.3 Logical Separation of multiple LAN traffic types ........................................................ 7

4.4 Prerequisites and Datacenter Planning .................................................................... 7

5 Architecture .......................................................................................................... 8

5.1 Network Architecture Overview ............................................................................ 8

5.2 LAN Architecture ............................................................................................ 10

5.2.1 Traffic Isolation using VLANs ........................................................................... 10

5.3 SAN Architecture ............................................................................................ 11

5.3.1 Traffic Isolation using VLAN ............................................................................ 11

5.3.2 EqualLogic Storage Concepts ........................................................................... 11

5.3.3 Volume Size Considerations ............................................................................ 11

5.3.4 Storage Array RAID Considerations .................................................................... 12

5.4 Hyper-V Role and Failover Clustering Design ........................................................... 13

5.4.1 Roles and Features ....................................................................................... 13

5.5 Management Architecture ................................................................................. 13

5.5.1 Management on the LAN ................................................................................ 13

6 Scalability ........................................................................................................... 16

6.1 Adding new servers to the Hyper-V Cluster ............................................................ 16

6.2 Adding new storage to the EqualLogic group........................................................... 16

7 References .......................................................................................................... 17

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vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

Tables

Table 1. Component Logical Groups ............................................................................... 4

Table 2. Traffic Type Summary ................................................................................... 10

Figures

Figure 1. vStart 100 Overview ....................................................................................... 2

Figure 2. vStart 200 Overview ....................................................................................... 3

Figure 3. vStart 100 and 200 Component Overview .............................................................. 6

Figure 4. vStart 200 Network Topology (Logical View) .......................................................... 9

Figure 5. EqualLogic Organizational Concepts .................................................................. 11

Figure 6. Management Overview (LAN) .......................................................................... 15

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vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

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1 Introduction

The vStart solution is a virtualization infrastructure solution that has been designed and validated by
Dell Engineering. It is delivered racked, cabled, and ready to be integrated into your datacenter. vStart
is offered as three configurations: vStart 501, 100 and 200.

The configurations include DellTM PowerEdgeTM R720 servers running Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008
R2 SP1 Datacenter Edition with Hyper-V® Role enabled, Dell EqualLogicTM PS6100 Series iSCSI storage,
Dell PowerConnectTM 7048 or 6248 switches, a Dell PowerEdge R620 server that manages the solution
by hosting Dell management tools and optional System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2.

The configurations also include Dell EqualLogic Host Integration Tools for Microsoft (HIT Kit) for
Windows Server 2008 R2. The two vStart configurations vary in the number of R720 servers and
EqualLogic PS6100 storage arrays to meet resource needs.

The following documents are provided to describe the various aspects of the solution. Contact your Dell
Sales or Services representative to get the latest revision of all the documents.

 vStart 100 and vStart 200 Hyper-V Reference Architecture (this document) – Provides a

reference overview, including various components, and how the solution is delivered.

 vStart 100 and vStart 200 Hyper-V Solution Overview – Provides a solution overview, including

various components, and how it is delivered.

 vStart 100 and vStart 200 Hyper-V Solution Specification – Provides a detailed specification of

various components included in the solution.

 vStart 100 and vStart 200 Hyper-V Solution Design Guide – Provides a detailed architectural

solution design.

2 Audience

This document provides an overview of the vStart solution. Customers, including CTOs and IT managers,
can use this document to understand the overview and scope of the solution.

IT administrators and managers can use this document to understand the solution architecture.

vStart 50 is covered by a separate set of documents.

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vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

EqualLogic PS6100

PowerEdge R720

PowerEdge R620

Hyper-V Cluster

Management Server (SCVMM, OMSA, SAN HQ)

iSCSI Storage

PowerConnect 7048

SAN Traffic (iSCSI)

PowerConnect 7048

LAN Traffic (VM, Management, Live Migration)

Optional – Available with vStart 100

Storage Expansion

EqualLogic SAN HQ and Group Manager, OMSA, Out of Band,

Virtualization Cluster Management

Management and Monitoring

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3 Solution Overview

The solution discussed in this whitepaper is powered by Dell PowerEdge servers, Dell EqualLogic iSCSI
storage, Dell PowerConnect networking, and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 with SP1. The solution
implements Dell and Microsoft best practices, and EqualLogic SAN HeadQuarters (SAN HQ) and Group
Manager are included in the solution for storage array monitoring and management. The solution also
includes the rack, power distribution units (PDU), and an optional uninterruptible power supply (UPS),
KMM (Keyboard, Monitor, Mouse), and management server.

The solution is offered in two main configurations, vStart 100 and 200. The variations between the two
configurations are the number of PowerEdge R720 servers in the Hyper-V cluster and the number of
EqualLogic storage arrays. vStart 100 includes three PowerEdge R720 servers and one EqualLogic
storage array. vStart 200 includes six PowerEdge R720 servers and two EqualLogic storage arrays. An
additional optional storage array can be added to both configurations and the resulting configuration
will be referred to as vStart 100+ or vStart 200+ in the remainder of this document. Figure 1 and Figure
2 below provide a high-level overview of the components utilized in each of the configurations.

vStart 100 Overview Figure 1.

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vStart 100 and 200 Reference Architecture

Hyper-V Cluster

iSCSI Storage

EqualLogic SAN HQ and Group Manager, OMSA, Out of Band,

Virtualization Cluster Management

Management and Monitoring

PowerEdge R620

Management Server (SCVMM, OMSA, SAN HQ)

Optional – Available with vStart 200

Storage Expansion

PowerConnect 7048

SAN Traffic (iSCSI)

PowerConnect 7048

LAN Traffic (VM, Management, Live Migration)

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PowerEdge R720

EqualLogic PS6100

Figure 2.

vStart 200 Overview

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