NLB on vmware and Procurve switch

[ArjenW]

Hi all,

We do have 2 virtual TMG nodes on ESXI which we want to configure with NLB to make them HA, so the service continue to be available when rebooting one of the hosts.

VMware is running on blade systems conencted with a flex10 module to the procurve switches.

How do we have to setup NLB, Flex10 and the switches to be able to reach the VIP addresses of the TMG's from the switches?
I have enabled routing and igmp routing on the switch, I have configured NLB to use IGMP Multicast, but the switch won't learn the MAC address of the NLB. Any suggestions?

[Mohammed Faiz]

I think you're hitting the unicast IP address with multicast MAC address problem.
There's a good document describing the mechanism of multicast load-balancing here:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps708/products_configuration_example09186a0080a07203.shtml

Unfortunately the solution is to use a static ARP entry but Procurve switches do not support this.

[Gerhard Roets]

Hi Arjen

Which model switches is it and what software are they running ?

Gerhard

[ArjenW]

It's a Procurve 5406Zl
Version: K.14.41, ROM K.12.20

The TMG nodes are connected with a Flex10 connection running firmware version 2.32

[Gerhard Roets · Accepted solution]

Hi Arjen

You might want to look at upgrading the switch to K.14.65. There is a feature there which will help.

The software can be found here http://h10144.www1.hp.com/customercare/support/software/summarypages/k-j8692-c.htm

You will be looking for the following in the release notes released in K.14.55
â   Enhancement (PR_0000018427) â Multicast ARP support enhancement.

ProCurve(config)# ip arp-mcast-replies

This should help you just have a look at the release notes.

HTH
Gerhard

[ArjenW]

Thanx for the reply. We will certainly take a look into it. I will suggest the upgrade internally and hope to get approval..

[ArjenW]

The upgrade of the firmware of the switches to the latest version available did indeed add the MAC address of the NLB Multicast cluster to the arp table of the switch. Thanx for the suggestion!

[ArjenW]

The upgrade of the firmware did solve my issue