To provide isolation between different portgroups while still reaping the benefits of NIC teaming and its reliable failover mechanisms, you can modify the default NIC teaming policy to provide each portgroup with its own dedicated active network adapter.
To accomplish NIC teaming:
Note: These instructions use the example configuration from above.
- Open the VMware Infrastructure Client and connect to the ESX host (or VirtualCenter) that you want to configure.
- Select the ESX host object in the inventory and click the Configuration tab.
- Click the Networking option under Hardware.
- Locate the virtual switch containing the portgroups you want to modify. In this case, it is vSwitch0.
- Verify that all three physical network adapters, vmnic0, vmnic1, and vmnic2, are assigned to vSwitch0.
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Click Properties. The Properties window for vSwitch0 displays.
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Click the first object in the list, vSwitch, and click Edit.
- In the window that opens, click the NIC Teaming tab and verify that all three vmnics are displayed under Active Adapters.
- Click OK to close the vSwitch Properties window.
- Click the Service Console portgroup and click Edit.
- In the window that opens, click the NIC Teaming tab and verify that all three vmnics are displayed under Active Adapters.
You want the Service Console to be dedicated to its own vmnic, vmnic0, under normal circumstances. To achieve this, select vmnic1 and click Move Down to move vmnic1 into a Standby Adapter role. - Select vmnic2 and click Move Down to move it to the list of Standby Adapters. At this point, vmnic0 is dedicated to the Service Console, but if vmnic0 fails, the Service Console will fail over to vmnic1 and then vmnic2.
- Click OK.
- Click the Production portgroup and follow steps 11 through 14 to move vmnic0 and vmnic2 to Standby Adapters. This dedicates vmnic1 to the Virtual Machine Network portgroup unless vmnic1 fails.
- Click the VMotion portgroup and follow steps 11 through 14 to move vmnic0 and vmnic1 to Standby Adapters. This dedicates vmnic2 to the VMotion portgroup while still allowing failover to the vmnic0 and vmnic1 adapters if vmnic2 were to fail.
When configured, this solution provides each portgroup with its own dedicated network adapter, effectively isolating it from the network activity of the others. However, it also allows each portgroup to be failed over to the two remaining network adapters if its own network adapter loses connectivity.