Hpe

In an earlier blog post I wrote a bit about virtual service routers. Now I want to show you how easily you can deploy a virtual service router in your lab. To do so I have downloaded the the HP VSR1000 Virtual Service Router and the Cisco Cloud Service Router 1000V. If you want to know how to download them, just read the mentioned blog post. Because both virtual service routers delivered as OVA, I can easily deploy them through the vSphere Client (sorry, no Web Client. It’s a standalone HP Micro Server without a vCenter). I will show an example on how to deploy the Cisco CSR1000V. That procedure is exactly the same for the HP VSR1000. The procedure is pretty straightforward. The screenshots are self-explanatory.

Today you can get nearly everything as a virtual appliance. So even a router. Usually virtual router appliances are used for the same purposes as physical router: Connecting different networks. A router is nothing more then a piece of hardware and software. Due to this fact a router can be easily deployed as a virtual appliance. So where do you find router typically? In you datacenter? Yes, but in a datacenter you will deal typically with layer-3 switches rather than a classical router. In you WAN? That’s much warmer. Think of all the CE router in the branch offices, or the router that is running at a SMB customer. Or the small linux VM with IPtables which secures a special VM on your hypervisor. Or public cloud deployments. But what’s the benefit of a virtual router?

TL;DR: The HP 4Gb Fibre Channel Pass-Thru Module is (as the name says) 4 Gb Fibre-Channel module. Even if HP delivers the module with 8 Gb SFP+ transceivers, the module can only provide a 4 Gb link. Don't make the same mistake as I did. Just because 8 Gb SFP + are included, it doesn't necessarily mean that the module provides an 8 Gb connection.

The HP 4Gb Fibre Channel Pass-Thru Module for c-Class BladeSystem (PN 403626-B21) is a interconnect module for the HP BladeSystem c-Class. It’s a simple pass-thru module, which provides a 1:1 non-switched, non-blocking paths between the server blade and a Fibre Channel Fabric. There are several Fibre Channel interconnect modules, like the Virtual Connect 8 Gb Fibre Channel modules (20 or 24 ports) or the Brocade and Cisco 8Gb SAN Switches for HP BladeSystem c-Class. The pass-thru modules is a good choice if the customer has a good Fibre Channel infrastructure and the number of servers is manageable. It’s much cheaper than the Virtual Connect Fibre Channel modules (which require a Virtual Connect Ethernet module for management) or the Brocade or Cisco MDS Fibre Channel switches for HP BladeSystem c-Class. But it also has disadvantages. it only provides a 4 Gb Fibre Channel link! Even if HP delivers the modules with 8 Gb SFP+ transceivers, only a maximum of 4 Gb are possible. Neither the Quick Specs, nor the HP support could make a statement which SFP+ transceivers are included. That 8Gb SFP+ transceivers are included, was a chance finding. Unfortunately HP doesn’t provide a 8 Gb pass-thru module and the 4 Gb pass-thru module doesn’t support 8 Gb connections, even with 8 Gb SFP+ transceivers. If you need a 8 Gb connection you have to use Virtual Connect or Brocade or Cisco MDS Fibre Channel switches.

After nearly 5 months released HP a new version of the HP Service Pack for ProLiant (SPP). The latest release is now 2014.02.

What is the HP Service Pack for ProLiant?

Back in the days there were two software products to update a ProLiant server with the latest firmware, drivers & agents.

• HP Smart Update Firmware DVD
• HP ProLiant Support Pack

the first one was bootable for offline firmware, and also contained Online ROM flash components for online firmware updates. The second was to install/ update the latest drivers and agents. The HP Service Pack for ProLiants (SPP) replaces both. The SPP is a comprehensive software and it’s delivered as a ISO. It can be burned to DVD, installed on a USB stick or extracted and run from the directory. The SPP used the [HP Smart Update Manager (SUM)](The HP SUM can be used as a standalone product.) as deployment tool. The HP SUM can be used as a standalone product.

Note

I work for a HP partner and a HP fanboy for about 15 years.

It’s only a small note in the HP support portal, but this small note has a large impact.

Starting February 2014, an active warranty or contract is required to access HP ProLiant Server firmware updates. View your existing contracts & warranties or get help linking contracts or warranties to your HP Support Center user profile. To obtain additional support coverage, please contact your local HP office, HP representative, or visit Contact HP. Click here for more information.

Information

Beginning with the TS251R004 firmware release, the HP MSA VAAI plug-in is no longer supported as the HP MSA controller firmware now uses T10 compliance in an ESX Environment documented in TS251R004.

The HP P2000 G3 and the HP MSA 2040 are two widely used entry-level storage arrays. The P2000 G3 is VAAI capable since firmware version T230. But, contrary to the HP MSA 2040, you have to install the software plug-in for VMware VAAI if you use the P2000 G3. According to the “HP MSA 2040 Storage Configuration and Best Practices for VMware vSphere” whitepaper the MSA 2040 supports VAAI nativly without an additional plugin.

Today I was onsite at a customer to bring a tiny VMware vSphere cluster to life (HP BladeSystem c7000 with 7 HP ProLiant BL460 Gen8). Normally no big deal, but it started with two unavailable Onboard Administrator (OA) network interfaces. I switched from static ip addresses to DHCP, but I had no luck. I noticed that both interfaces were available if I connect my notebook directly to the interfaces. I even noticed that the Insight Display was unresponsive after connecting one or both OA to the network. The customer told me, that they had yesterday network related problems with virtual AND physical machines. Short outages, lost pings, things like that. This morning, before I arrived on site, the problems were worse. The customer told me that they had this network problems for a while. They had a lot of work and the outages were annoying, but not a big problem. The network of the BladeSystem were already connected (HP 10GbE Pass-Thru modules), but this kind of interconnect couldn’t cause this kind of problems. I checked the Switches and found on EVERY SINGLE ACTIVE port an enormous amount of “Drops TX”. But I found no loops or something like that. The network was flat. One VLAN and a /16 network. Not nice, but functional. I asked the customer to start Wireshark. I wanted to take a look around, get a feeling for what was going on in the network. Wireshark started and… stopped responding. After a couple of seconds it came back and I saw traffic that was… spooky. Usually I expect things like broadcasts, ARP, traffic from my client or for my client. But I saw traffic from a domain controller to a Windows NLB cluster and Citrix traffic to a Windows NLB cluster. I checked if the workstation was connected to a monitoring port, but it wasn’t. And it was only traffic with destination to the Windows NLB cluster. Our network problems had something to do with the Windows NLB. The customer and I decided to stop both NLB nodes. After that: Silence… I saw the expected traffic in Wireshark and my OA were both responding. Everything was fine… until we started the NLB again.