Dell PowerEdge R7415 User Manual
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure
Stack HCI
2-Node Hyperconverged Back-to-Back Connected
Infrastructure
June 2019
REV 08
Deployment Guide
Dell EMC Solutions
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2 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Overview 5
Introduction..................................................................................................6
Audience and scope......................................................................................6
Assumptions................................................................................................. 6
Known issues................................................................................................ 7
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes 9
Overview.....................................................................................................10
R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node...................................................12
Storage Spaces Direct................................................................................ 13
Solution component integration 15
Overview.....................................................................................................16
Network connectivity..................................................................................16
Virtualized infrastructure deployment by using Dell EMC Ready
Nodes 19
Overview.................................................................................................... 20
Deployment prerequisites...........................................................................20
Software versions..........................................................................20
Dell EMC validated firmware matrix............................................... 21
Deployment checklists................................................................................ 21
Management environment checklist...............................................21
Network configuration checklist.....................................................21
Host OS network checklist............................................................ 22
Predeployment configuration..................................................................... 23
Network switch configuration........................................................23
iDRAC and BIOS configuration...................................................... 24
QLogic NIC configuration.............................................................. 26
Firmware baselining....................................................................... 29
Chapter 5
Hyperconverged infrastructure deployment 31
Overview.................................................................................................... 32
Deploy operating system............................................................................ 32
Manual OS deployment..................................................................32
Factory-installed OS......................................................................32
Update out-of-box drivers.......................................................................... 33
Install roles and features.............................................................................34
Change hostname.......................................................................................34
Configure firewall....................................................................................... 34
Configure host networking......................................................................... 35
VM switch and adapter configuration............................................ 35
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 3
Contents
AD domain join............................................................................................37
Create host cluster.....................................................................................38
Configuring Storage Spaces Direct............................................................ 38
Change RDMA mode on QLogic NICs—iWARP only.................................. 39
Update page file settings............................................................................39
Enabling jumbo frames............................................................................... 40
Remove host management network from Live Migration............................40
Update hardware timeout for Spaces port.................................................. 41
Configuring a cluster witness...................................................................... 41
Recommended next steps........................................................................... 41
Chapter 6
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
Deployment services 43
Overview.................................................................................................... 44
Additional resources 45
Firewall port requirements 47
Sample deployment checklists 49
4 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
CHAPTER 1
Overview
This chapter presents the following topics:
l
Introduction......................................................................................................... 6
l
Audience and scope............................................................................................. 6
l
Assumptions.........................................................................................................6
l
Known issues........................................................................................................7
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 5
Overview
Introduction
This guide focuses on deploying a 2-node back-to-back connected hyperconverged
infrastructure solution for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI. The guide includes an overview
of the solution infrastructure, guidance on how to integrate the solution components,
and instructions for preparing and deploying the solution infrastructure. This guide is
applicable only to infrastructure that is built by using the validated and certified Dell
EMC Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct Ready Nodes.
Audience and scope
The audience for this document includes systems engineers, field consultants, partner
engineering team members, and customers with a fair amount of knowledge in
deploying hyperconverged infrastructures with Microsoft Windows Server 2016 or
Windows Server 2019 Hyper-V and Storage Spaces Direct.
Customers who do not have Volume License agreements with Microsoft can order Dell
EMC Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct Ready Nodes with the operating system
preinstalled at the factory with OEM license or bare metal.
The Storage Spaces Direct Cluster deployment can be done in two ways:
l
Dell EMC Services led: Certified deployment engineers can deploy the solution,
which ensures accuracy and speed, reduced risk and down time.
l
Customer led: Customers can deploy the solution by referring to this deployment
guide, provided they have the qualified level of technical expertise.
Assumptions
Note:
Instructions in this deployment guide are applicable only to the generally
available OS build of Windows Server 2016 with the latest applicable updates and
Windows Server 2019 GA build with latest OS updates. These instructions are not
validated with Windows Server, version 1709. Storage Spaces Direct Ready nodes
do not support the Windows Server Semi-Annual Channel release. Dell EMC
recommends that you update the host OS with latest cumulative updates from
Microsoft before starting the cluster creation and configuration tasks.
Note: While the instructions in this deployment guide can be used with other Dell
EMC Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct Ready Nodes, R640 Storage Spaces Direct
Ready Node has been used as an example for the deployment instructions.
This deployment guide makes certain assumptions about the necessary prerequisite
knowledge of the deployment personnel. This includes the prerequisite knowledge of:
l
Dell EMC Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct Ready Nodes and deploying and
configuring BIOS and iDRAC settings
l
Deploying and configuring Windows Server 2016 and Windows Server 2019 HyperV infrastructure
6 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
Known issues
Overview
Before starting the cluster deployment, ensure that you review the known issues and
workarounds. See https://www.dell.com/support/article/sln313305.
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 7
Overview
8 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
CHAPTER 2
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC
Ready Nodes
This chapter presents the following topics:
l
Overview............................................................................................................ 10
l
R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node.......................................................... 12
l
Storage Spaces Direct........................................................................................13
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 9
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes
Overview
Dell EMC Solutions for Azure Stack HCI encompasses various configurations of
R740xd, R740xd2, and R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node and PowerEdge
R440 servers to power the primary compute cluster deployed as a hyperconverged
infrastructure. This hyperconverged infrastructure built by using these Ready Nodes
uses a flexible solution architecture rather than a fixed component design. Figure 1
illustrates one of the flexible solution architectures consisting of compute cluster
alongside the redundant top-of-rack switches, a separate out-of-band (OOB)
network, and an existing management infrastructure in the data center.
The Dell EMC Solutions for Azure Stack HCI based on Dell EMC Storage Spaces
Direct Ready Nodes is available in both hybrid and all-flash configurations.
For more information on available configurations, see Dell EMC Ready Nodes for
Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct with Hyper-V Solution Overview.
Note: For the 2-node cluster deployment, it is mandatory that a cluster witness is
configured. See the section on configuring cluster witness for available options
and other references to deployment instructions.
10 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes
Figure 1 2-Node hyperconverged virtualized solution using Dell EMC Ready Nodes
Dell EMC Solutions for Azure Stack HCI does not include management infrastructure
components such as a cluster for hosting management VMs and services such as
Active Directory (AD), Domain Name Service (DNS); Windows Server Update
Services (WSUS); and System Center components such as Operations Manager
(OM). Therefore, the instructions in this guide do not include deployment of any of
these services and components, and assume that at least an Active Directory domain
controller is available in the existing management infrastructure.
When deployed in a remote office scenario, Dell EMC recommends that you deploy
either an Active Directory replica or Ready-Only Domain Controller (RODC) at the
remote office. If you are using a RODC at the remote site, connectivity to the central
management infrastructure with a writeable domain controller is mandatory during
deployment of the 2-node cluster.
The subsequent sections provide an overview of the hardware and software
components in the virtualized solution based on Dell EMC Ready Nodes.
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 11
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes
R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node
R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node, a 1U rack server based on the PowerEdge
R640, is optimized for software-defined storage implementations that enable
hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) implementations. This Ready Node supports up
to two CPU sockets, with a wide range of options for the number of cores per CPU
socket, and 1.5 TB of memory when using DDR4 DIMMs.
The R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node in a back-to-back connected
configuration is available only in a 10-drive chassis configuration in both hybrid and allflash configurations. For more details about the configuration, see https://
www.dell.com/learn/shared-content~data-sheets~en/documents~microsoftstorage-spaces-direct-ready-nodes-solution-overview-en.pdf.
Figure 2 Disk configuration in a Dell EMC Ready Node based on R640 Storage Spaces Direct
Ready Node with 10 drives (hybrid)
Figure 3 Disk configuration in a Dell EMC Ready Node based on R640 Storage Spaces Direct
Ready Node with 10 drives (all-flash)
The R640 Storage Spaces Direct Ready Node in a back-to-back connected
configuration supports only one add-in network adapter.
12 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes
The following table provides an overview of the R640 Storage Spaces Ready Node in
the solution.
Table 1 System components
Component Specification
Compute cluster node R640 Storage Spaces Ready Node
NIC 1 x Mellanox Connectx-4 LX 25 GbE SFP add-in adapter
or
1 x QLogic FastLinQ 41262 25 GbE SFP28 add-in adapter
and
Dual-port 10 GbE or dual-port 1 GbE rNDC
Storage adapter HBA 330 Mini
Boot device BOSS S.1 with 2 x BOSS M.2 devices in RAID 1
Drives See Dell EMC Ready Nodes for Microsoft Storage
Spaces Direct with Hyper-V Solution Overview
Because this 2-node configuration implements back-to-back connectivity of the
servers using either the Mellanox or QLogic RDMA-capable NICs, a data center
bridging (DCB) policy or RoCE for RDMA configurations in the host operating system
are not needed.
If the nodes are configured with QLogic FastLinQ 41262 adapters, Dell EMC
recommends using iWARP for RDMA.
For a list of switches that are supported in this configuration, see the Support Matrix
at https://www.dell.com/azurestackhcimanuals.
Storage Spaces Direct
Storage Spaces Direct was first introduced in Windows Server 2016. This storage
feature uses the local disks within the nodes to create highly available softwaredefined storage. This feature is enhanced further in Windows Server 2019 with the
addition of support for deduplication among many other features and enhancements.
Two deployment options are possible for Storage Spaces Direct. In the first option,
the storage and compute cluster are kept separate. This method, which is known as
converged or disaggregated deployment, allows for scaling of storage and compute
clusters in a manner that is independent of each other. The second deployment
option, known as hyperconverged deployment, enables running the virtualization
services directly on top of the servers that host Storage Spaces Direct. This method
ensures that there is no need to configure and maintain file services separately in a
different cluster and, therefore, reduces the need for additional physical servers.
This deployment guide focuses on a hyperconverged deployment of Storage Spaces
Direct. For more information about Storage Spaces Direct and these deployment
options, see https://technet.microsoft.com/EN-US/windows-server-docs/storage/
storage-spaces/storage-spaces-direct-overview.
This guide provides the deployment instructions for implementing a Storage Spaces
Direct hyperconverged cluster that is built using Dell EMC Ready Nodes. The following
figure provides an overview of the deployment.
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 13
Virtualization infrastructure with Dell EMC Ready Nodes
Figure 4 Deployment overview
14 Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI
CHAPTER 3
Solution component integration
This chapter presents the following topics:
l
Overview............................................................................................................ 16
l
Network connectivity......................................................................................... 16
Dell EMC Solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack HCI 15
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