vSwitch load balancing policy in Virtual Connect Active-Active configuration

[chuckk281]

Gautham had a question on load balancing:

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Hi guys,

Sanity check:

Just to confirm, when we are using an active-active Virtual Connect configuration with ESXi 5.5 hosts, the vSwitch load balancing policy should NOT be Route based on IP hash.

The individual VMnics will be going to different VC modules & not be in the same LACP group(which will lead to MAC flapping in the uplink switches).

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Input from Robert:

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You are correct.  It should be route based on originating port ID.

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More from Dave:

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Elaborating a bit more…

http://h20566.www2.hp.com/portal/site/hpsc/template.BINARYPORTLET/public/kb/docDisplay/resource.process/?spf_p.tpst=kbDocDisplay_ws_BI&spf_p.rid_kbDocDisplay=docDisplayResURL&javax.portlet.begCacheTok=com.vignette.cachetoken&spf_p.rst_kbDocDisplay=wsrp-resourceState%3DdocId%253Demr_na-c03278211-2%257CdocLocale%253D&javax.portlet.endCacheTok=com.vignette.cachetoken

VMware provides a number of different NIC teaming algorithms, which are outlined in Table 2-3. As the table shows, any of the available algorithms can be used, except IP Hash. IP Hash requires switch assisted load balancing (802.3ad), which Virtual Connect does not support 802.3ad with server downlink ports. HP and VMware recommend using Originating Virtual Port ID with Standard vSwitch, and Physical NIC Load when using vDS and NetIOC, as shown in Table 2-3.

Table 2-3 VMware Load Balancing Algorithms
Name	Algorithm	Works with VC
Originating   Virtual Port ID	Choose   an uplink based on the virtual port where the traffic entered the virtual   switch.	Yes
Source MAC Address	MAC Address seen on vnic port	Yes
IP Hash	Hash of   Source and Destination IP’s. Requires switch assisted load balancing,   802.3ad. Virtual Connect does not support 802.3ad on server downlink ports,   as 802.3ad is a Point-to-Point bonding protocol.	No
Physical   NIC Load	Introduced   in vSphere 4.1 and only available with a vDS, Load-Based Teaming policy   monitors the flow when the mean send or receive utilization on a dvUplink   exceeds 75% capacity over 30-sec intervals.	Yes
Explicit Failover	Highest order uplink from the list of Active pNICs.	Yes

Regards

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Any other comments or questions?