topic Re: VIrtual Connect, Flex 10, VMWare Nexus 1000V PVLAN Question in BladeSystem - General

VIrtual Connect, Flex 10, VMWare Nexus 1000V PVLAN Question

GeorgeO — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 08:48:29 GMT

Flex10 and PVLANS on VMware.

Read the HP Virtual Connect for the Cisco admin guide. I think it was Pg15 said that you can implement PVLANS through virtual connect if you tag the VLANs as Private Networks.

I have a c7000 with a pair of flex 10's each with a single 10Gb uplink connecting to an onward Cisco 3750 switch,

My issue is - I've created some virtual connect private networks for my PVLAN traffic. Created some community PVLANs for testing.

All is fine on the same VMWare server host - I can happily setup VM's in a Community PVLAN and the VM's will talk to each other.

However, if I am unable to communicate from a VM on the first server host to a VM in the same community PVLAN on the second physical host.

Of course, for the servers to speak to each other they have to go through Flex10. The PVLANs are marked as private so should go to the onward Cisco 3750 from the Flex10 uplinks.

So, I have a simple question and a more difficult question:

(1) Although PVLANS are supported on virtual connect as per the HP Virtual Connect Guide for Cisco Admins - are they supported with Flex10.

(2) If they are supported through Flex10 - can anyone give me some pointers as to how to get this working?

Re: VIrtual Connect, Flex 10, VMWare Nexus 1000V PVLAN Question

HEM_2 — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 13:56:38 GMT

I don't think what you are trying to do will work.

From the VC for Cisco Admin guide:

"Virtual Connect does not support user-configurable port or VLAN ACLs, nor does it support Cisco Private VLANs (PVLANS). However, an Administrator can specifically design the deployment of vNets and/or VC Private Networks to make use of these features configured on the upstream Cisco switch.

When a vNet is define as a Private Network within Virtual Connect the servers on that vNet will not be able to communicate with each other, only to the uplinks. The upstream Cisco switch can be configured with PVLANs and ACLs as required to create a complete end to end solution."

So the statement: you can implement PVLANS *through* virtual connect if you tag the VLANs as Private Networks is somewhat inaccurate. The aspect that complicates matters here is the configuration of PVLANs on the 1000V. VC has no mechanism to support PVLANs but the configuration of PVLANs on the 1000V would require it.

Re: VIrtual Connect, Flex 10, VMWare Nexus 1000V PVLAN Question

GeorgeO — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 10:58:28 GMT

Given that all my blades are ESX hosts, even if I wanted to use Private VLANS between these hosts (i.e no PVLANS beyond the blade chassis), I presume this is not possible because virtual connect will drop Cisco PVLAN traffic between physical VM Hosts within the chassis?