UC on UCS ESXi on C220M3 TRC1

[Kevin Frazer]

Hi! So I've heard conflicting stories about the ESXi Hypervisor installation on a C220M3 under TRC1 (Flex Flash card vs directly on RAID set). So here goes.... I'm getting ready to do a P2V migration for my entire UC infrastructure. My question is can you use the Flex Flash card as the primary Hypervisor (supporting all the UC VM's) or does it need to be installed on the RAID set directly? The documentation states that the HV partition on the Flex Flash can be used for the ESXi install (I'm familiar with that installation process). What it doesn't say is whether the Flex Flash card can be used as the primary Hypervisor supporting all the UC VM's. I can't find any "best practice" UC on UCS documentation that can give me a definitive answer as too the "preferred" route to take. Thanks for the assistance!

[jarias · Accepted solution]

Right now this is covered in the storage section of the hardware page which you get to from www.cisco.com/go/uc-virtualized .

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/UC_Virtualization_Supported_Hardware#Storage way at the bottom of the section.

Tested Reference Configurations only validate one boot option as part of the solution testing.

As part of being considered a TRC for support purposes, ESXi must go on DAS (for current C-Series TRCs) or on the FC SAN (for current diskless B-Series TRCs).   For specifics of the RAID configuration for each C-Series TRC, see http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/voice_ip_comm/cucm/virtual/CUCM_BK_CF3D71B4_00_cucm_virtual_servers.html which is linked off the HW page and a few other locations. 

If instead you are doing Specs-based, the Collaboration rules don't currently allow boot from SD either, but we are looking to change that.

When we first started virtualization back in 2010, RAID was also recommended by VMware engineering as most fault tolerant option (vs. boot from USB key back then).  We are seeing growing interest in re-considering boot from SD now that redundant SD are available, but would like to better understand why as this is reverse direction from customer preferences we were previously seeing.

What are drivers for wanting to boot from SD instead of boot from DAS?

1. boot from SD is backwards from previous direction we were seeing in large deployments, where customers were preferring diskless servers and boot from SAN, to reduce net server hardware spend and power consumption due to local disks
2. in smaller environments, boot from SD or USB was asked about when we used to require dedicated disk pair for ESXi.  Now that all our TRCs share ESXi and apps on DAS, and ESXi does not consume a major part of that DAS, what does SD bring?
3. We've also wanted to minimize procedure change impact on our partners and installed base, who have been installed ESXi on DAS for over 4 years now.  Switching TRCs to SD card also changes a lot of operational procedures that would have to be re-learned when they added or refreshed servers. 

[Kevin Frazer]

Hi Jarias,

Thanks for your response. Very clear and concise. I think the only reason to install to flex flash is like you say, the redundant SD card option. ....But being a partner, I want to make sure if my customers ever need to call TAC, they are calling in with a supported hardware configuration. If its not currently supported to boot from flex flash, and I'm installing it per a TRC, I will install the HV to DAS. One more question... You mention above that Cisco is looking to change the unsupported "boot from SD card" option for the specs-based configuration. Do you speculate that change will come in the not-so-distant future or will it take quite a bit longer to implement?

Also, is Cisco considering the same change in procedure to the TRC based approach? Even though you don't mention it above, I'd like to get your personal opinion.

Thanks again!

[jarias]

To kfrazer77…

For specs-based I’d like to allow SD options (maybe within next few quarters) but we haven’t committed an ETA …. still checking in with impacted stakeholders and currently this is a lower priority investigation.

I don’t intend to change TRC unless we see broad partner/customer preference for changing from HDD to SD. Last time I polled the partner community consensus was ambivalence, and outside of Data Center most of our customers are fine with HDD DAS (or solid state DAS if the price ever comes down).

-james