1.

How HA Works (HIgh Availability)

VSphere HA provides high availability for virtual machines by pooling the virtual
machines and the hosts they reside on into a cluster. Hosts in the cluster are
monitored and in the event of a failure, the virtual machines on a failed host are
restarted on alternate hosts.

VMware vSphere HA allows organizations to improve availability by automatically

detecting failed VMs and restarting them on different physical servers without
manual human involvement. The ability to restart these VMs on different physical
hardware is possible because Virtual Machine Disk (VMDK) files are kept on shared
storage, accessible to all physical servers connected via HA cluster.

VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) is often used in conjunction with

vSphere HA to rebalance workloads that must be restarted on alternate hosts. An
organization that uses vSphere HA and DRS together can ensure that restarted VMs do
not affect the performance of other VMs on the failover host.

The VMware Fault Tolerance feature can also ensure very high levels of
availability. While vSphere HA restarts failed VMs after a short detection and
boot-up time, Fault Tolerance maintains a redundant copy of the protected VM that
can seamlessly take over the operations of the failed copy.
How vSphere HA works

VMware vSphere HA uses a utility called the Fault Domain Manager agent to monitor
ESXi host availability and to restart failed VMs. When setting up vSphere HA, an
administrator defines a group of servers to serve as a high-availability cluster.
The Fault Domain Manager runs on each host within the cluster. One host in the
cluster serves as the master host -- all other hosts are referred to as slaves --
to monitor signals from other hosts in the cluster and communicate with the vCenter
Server.

VMware updated vSphere HA in 2017.

Host servers within an HA cluster communicate via a heartbeat, which is a periodic

message that indicates a host is running as expected. If the master host fails to
detect a heartbeat signal from another host or VM within the cluster, it instructs
vSphere HA to take corrective actions. The type of action depends on the type of
failure detected, as well as user preferences. In the case of a VM failure in which
the host server continues to run, vSphere HA restarts the VM on the original host.
If an entire host fails, the utility restarts all affected VMs on other hosts in
the cluster.

The HA utility can also restart VMs if a host continues to run, but loses a network
connection to the rest of the cluster. The master host can monitor if that host is
still communicating with network-connected data stores to detect if a network-
segregated host is still running. Shared storage, such as a storage area network,
enables hosts in the cluster to access VM disk files and restart the VM, even if it
was running on another server in the cluster.

2.How does DRS Works (DISTRIBUTED RESOURCE SCHEDULER)

DRS works on a cluster of ESXi hosts and provides resource management capabilities
like load balancing and virtual machine (VM) placement. DRS also enforces user-
defined resource allocation policies at the cluster level,

3.datastore full case

Increase capacity
Move virtual machines to other storage
Add additional datastores
Remove old snapshots
Clean up VMware VMFS

4.FT
VMware Fault Tolerance provides continuous availability for virtual machines by
creating and maintaining a Secondary VM that is identical to, and continuously
available to replace, the Primary VM in the event of a failover situation.

You can enable Fault Tolerance for most mission critical virtual machines
These are the vSphere FT maximums:

Virtual disks: 16
Disk size: 2 TB
Virtual CPUs per VM: 4
RAM per FT VM: 64 GB
FT VMs per host: 4
Virtual CPUs per host: 8

Hypervisor

What is VMKernel and why it is important?

VMkernel is a virtualization interface between a Virtual Machine and the ESXi host
which stores VMs. It is responsible to allocate all available resources of ESXi
host to VMs such as memory, CPU, storage etc. It’s also controlled special services
such as vMotion, Fault tolerance, NFS, traffic management and iSCSI. To access
these services, VMkernel port can be configured on ESXi server using a standard or
distributed vSwitch. Without VMkernel, hosted VMs cannot communicate with ESXi
server.

What is the hypervisor and its types?

A hypervisor is a virtualization layer that enables multiple operating systems to

share a single hardware host. Each operating system or VM is allocated physical
resources such as memory, CPU, storage etc by the host. There are two types of
hypervisors

Hosted hypervisor (works as application i-e VMware Workstation)

Bare-metal (is virtualization software i-e VMvisor, Hyper-V which is installed
directly onto the hardware and controls all physical resources).

What is Virtualization?

The process of creating virtual versions of physical components i-e Servers,

Storage Devices, Network Devices on a physical host is called virtualization.
Virtualization lets you run multiple virtual machines on a single physical machine
which is called ESXi host.

What are the different types of virtualization?

There are 5 basic types of virtualization

Server virtualization: consolidates the physical server and multiple OS can be

run on a single server.
Network Virtualization: Provides complete reproduction of physical network into
a software-defined network.
 Storage Virtualization: Provides an abstraction layer for physical storage
resources to manage and optimize in virtual deployment.
Application Virtualization: increased mobility of applications and allows
migration of VMs from a host on another with minimal downtime.
Desktop Virtualization: virtualize desktop to reduce cost and increase service

Fault Tolerance (FT)

What is VMware FT?

FT stands for Fault Tolerance very prominent component of VMware vSphere. It

provides continuous availability for VMs when an ESXi host fails. It supports up to
4 vCPUs and 64 GB memory. FT is very bandwidth intensive and 10GB NIC is
recommended to configure it. It creates a complete copy of an entire VM such as
storage, compute, and memory.

How many vCPUs can be used for a VM in FT?

In vSphere 6.0, there can be up to 4 vCPUs and 64 GB RAM can be used.

What is the name of the technology used by VMware FT?

vLockstep technology is used by VMware FT

What is Fault Tolerant Logging?

The communication between two ESXi hosts is called FT logging when FT is configured
between them. The pre-requisition of configuring FT is to configure VMKernel port.

Will the FT work if vCenter Server goes down?

vCenter server is only required to enable Fault Tolerance on a VM. Once it is
configured, vCenter is not required to be in online for FT to work. FT failover
between primary and secondary will occur even if the vCenter is down.
What is the main difference between VMware HA and FT?

The main difference between VMware HA and FT is: HA is enabled per cluster and
VMware FT is enabled per VM. In HA, VMs will be re-started and powered-on on
another host in case of a host failure, while in FT there is no downtime because
the second copy will be activated in case of host failure.
Virtual Networking

What is virtual networking?

A network of VMs running on a physical server that is connected logically with each
other is called virtual networking.

What is vSS?

vSS stands for Virtual Standard Switch is responsible for communication of VMs
hosted on a single physical host. it works like a physical switch automatically
detects a VM which want to communicate with other VM on a same physical server.

What is vDS?

vDS stands for Virtual Distributed Switch acts as a single switch in a whole
virtual environment and is responsible to provide central provisioning,
administration, and monitoring of the virtual network.

How many maximum standard ports per host available?

4096 ports per host are available either in a standard switch or distributed
switch.

What are the main benefits of distributed switch (vDS)?

vDS can provide:

Central administration for a data center

Central provision, and
Monitoring

What is VMKernal adapter and why it used?

VMKernel adapter provides network connectivity to the ESXi host to handle network
traffic for vMotion, IP Storage, NAS, Fault Tolerance, and vSAN. For each type of
traffic such as vMotion, vSAN etc. separate VMKernal adapter should be created and
configured.

What is the main use of port groups in data center virtualization?

You can segregate the network traffic by using port groups such as vMotion, FT,
management traffic etc.

What are three port groups are configured in ESXi networking?

Virtual Machine Port Group – Used for Virtual Machine Network

Service Console Port Group – Used for Service Console Communications
VMKernel Port Group – Used for VMotion, iSCSI, NFS Communications

What is VLAN and why use in virtual networking?

A logical configuration on the switch port to segment the IP Traffic where each
segment cannot communicate with other segments without proper rules mentioned is
called VLAN and every VLAN has a proper number called VLAN ID.

What is VLAN Tagging?

The practice of inserting VLAN ID into a packet header to identify which VLAN
packet belongs to is called VLAN tagging.

What are three network security policies/modes on vSwitch?

Promiscuous mode
MAC address change
Forged transmits

What is promiscuous mode on vSwitch?

The default mode is Reject. If Accept is selected, VM will receive all traffic port
group via vSwitch.

What is MAC address changes network policy?

The default mode of this policy is Reject. If the Accept is selected, a host will
accept requests to change the effective MAC address.

What is Forged transmits network policy?

The default mode is Reject. If Accept is selected, a host will not compare the
source and effective MAC address transmitted from a VM.
vCenter Server

What are the main components of vCenter Server architecture?

There are three main components of vCenter Server architecture.

vSphere Client and Web Client: a user interface.

vCenter Server database: SQL server or embedded PostgreSQL to store inventory,
security roles, resource pools etc.
SSO: a security domain in a virtual environment

What is PSC and its components?

PSC stands for Platform Services Controller first introduced in version 6 of VMware
vSphere which handles infrastructure security functions. It has three main
components.

Single Sign-On (SSO)

VMware Certificate Authority (CA)
Licensing service

What are the two main deploying methods of PSC

You can install PSC in two ways:

Embedded
centralized

What are different types of vCenter Server deployment?

It has two deployment types

Embedded Deployment
External deployment

What is vRealize Operation (vROP)

vROP provides the operation dashboards for performance analytics, capacity

optimization and monitoring the virtual environment.

What is the basic security step to secure vCenter Server and users?

Authenticate vCenter Server with Active Directory. By using this we can assign
specific roles to users and can also manage the virtual environment in an efficient
way.
Virtual Storage (Datastore)

What is datastore?

Datastore is a storage location where virtual machine files are stored and
accessed. Datastore is based on a file system which is called VMFS, NFS.

What is the .vmx file?

It is the configuration file of a VM

What information .nvram file stores?

It stores BIOS related information of a VM.

What .vmdk file does and used?

Vmdk is a VM disk file and stores data of a VM. It can be up to 62 TB in size in

vSphere 6.0 version.

How many disk types are in VMware?

There are three disk types in vSphere.

Thick Provisioned Lazy Zeroes: every virtual disk is created by default in this
disk format. Physical space is allocated to a VM when a virtual disk is created. It
can’t be converted to thin disk.
Thick Provision Eager Zeroes: this disk type is used in VMware Fault Tolerance.
All required disk space is allocated to a VM at time of creation. It takes more
time to create a virtual disk compare to other disk formats.
Thin provision: It provides an on-demand allocation of disk space to a VM. When
data size grows, the size of a disk will grow. Storage capacity utilization can be
up to 100% with thin provisioning.
What is Storage vMotion?

It is similar to traditional vMotion, in Storage vMotion, a virtual disk of a VM is

moved from datastore to another. During Storage vMotion, virtual disk types think
provisioning disk can be transformed to thin provisioned disk.
What’s New in vSphere 6.0

What is VM Hardware version for vSphere 6.0?

Version 11

What VM hardware version for vSphere 6.5?

Version 13

In which version of vSphere PSC was introduced?

Platform Services Controller (PSC) is introduced in vSphere 6.0. vSphere 6.0 is

also known as Virtual hardware version 11.

How many maximum hosts can manage a vCenter Server in vSphere 6.0?

In vSphere 6.0, a single vCenter Server can manage up to 1000 hosts either in
Windows or in vCenter Appliance (vCSA).

How many hosts can be managed by a cluster in vSphere 6.0?

A single cluster can manage maximum 64 hosts

How can maximum VMs be managed by a single cluster?

A single cluster can manage the maximum of 8000 VMs.

What is VVol?

Virtual Volume a new VM disk management concept introduced in vSphere 6.0 that
enables array-based operations at the virtual disk level. VVol is automatically
created when a virtual disk is created in a virtual environment for a VM.
 How many licensing options for vSphere 6.0?

There are three licensing options for vSphere 6.0:

Standard Edition: Contains 1 vCenter Server Standard license, up to 2 vCPUs for

Fault Tolerance, vMotion, Storage vMotion, HA, VVols etc.
Enterprise Edition: Same as Standard Edition additionally APIs for Array
Integration and Multipathing, DRS, and DPM.
Enterprise Plus: Includes all features of Standard and Enterprise Editions with
additionally Fault Tolerance upto 4 vCPUs and 64GB of RAM. It also includes
Distributed vSwitch and the most expensive licensing option of vSphere 6.0.

How much Maximum RAM can support vSphere 6.0?

It supports upto 12TB of RAM.

Content Libraries

What is the Content Library?

Content Library is the central location point between two different geographical
locations with vCenter Servers where you can store VM templates, ISO images,
scripts etc. and share them between geographical locations

What are the main benefits of content libraries?

We create VM templates and can share on another geographical location of a company

without creating again on other locations. It has many benefits such as sharing and
consistency, storage efficiency, and secure subscription.

How many types of Content Libraries have?

It has three types:

Local: library of local control.

Published: local library which contents (VM templates, ISO images etc) for
subscription.
Subscribed: A library which syncs with the published library
What are the requirements and limitations of Content Libraries?

A content library has the following requirements and limitations

Single storage which can size upto 64TB

Maximum of 256 items per library
Sync occurs once every 24 hours

What is VMFS?

VMFS is a file system for a VM in VMware vSphere. VMFS is a datastore that

responsible for storing virtual machine files. VMFS can also store large files
which size can up to 64TB in vSphere 6.0
VSAN

What is vSAN?

Virtual SAN is a software-defined storage first introduced in vSphere 5.5 and is

fully integrated with vSphere. It aggregates locally attached storage of ESXi hosts
which are part of a cluster and creates a distributed shared solution.
 What is cold migration?

To move a powered-off VM from one host to another is called cold migration.

What is Storage vMotion?

To move a powered-on VM from one datastore to another is called Storage vMotion.

What are the different configuration options for VSAN?

There are two configuration options for vSAN:

Hybrid: Uses both flash-based and magnetic disks for storage. Flash are used
for cashing, while magnetic disks are used for capacity or storage.
All-Flash: Uses flash for both caching and for storage

Are there VSAN ready nodes are available in the market?

Yes, vSAN-ready such as VxRail 4.0 and 4.5 are available in the market. VxRail is
the combination of min 3 servers which are part of a cluster and can scale up to 64
servers.

How minimum servers/hosts are required to configure vSAN?

To configure a vSAN, you should have minimum 3 ESXi hosts/servers in the form of a
vSAN cluster. If one of the servers fails, a vSAN cluster will fail.

How are many maximum ESXi hosts allowed for vSAN?

64 hosts are max allowed to configure a vSAN cluster.

How many disk groups and max magnetic disks are allowed in single disk group?

Maximum 5 disk groups are allowed on an ESXi host which is a part of a vSAN cluster
and a maximum of 7 magnetic and 1 SSD per disk group is allowed.

How many types of storages can we use in our virtual environment?

Direct Attached Storage

Fiber Channel (FC)
iSCSI
Network Attached Storage (NAS)

What is NFS?

Network File System (NFS) is a file sharing protocol that ESXi hosts use to
communicate with a NAS device. NAS is a specialized storage device that connects to
a network and can provide file access services to ESXi hosts.

What is Raw Device Mapping (RDM)?

Raw Device Mapping (RDM) is a file stored in a VMFS volume that acts as a proxy for
a raw physical device. RDM enables you to store virtual machine data directly on a
LUN. RDM is recommended when a VM must interact with a real disk on the SAN.

What is iSCSI storage?

An iSCSI SAN consists of an iSCSI storage system, which contains one or more
storage processors. TCP/IP protocol is used to communicate between host and storage
array. an iSCSI initiator is configured with the ESXi host. an iSCSI initiator can
be a hardware-based either dependent or independent and software-based known as
iSCSI software initiator.

What is the format of iSCSI addressing?

It uses TCP/IP to configure.

What are iSCSI naming conventions?

iSCSI names are formatted in two different ways:

the iSCSI qualified name (IQN)

extended unique identifier (EUI)

vApp

What is vApp?

vApp is a container or group where more than one VM can be package and manage
multi-tiered applications for specific requirements for example, Web server,
database server, and application server can be configured as a vApp and can be
defined their power-on and power-off sequence.

What settings can be configured for vApp?

We can configure several settings for vApp such as CPU and memory allocation, and
IP allocation policy etc.
Miscellaneous

What is VMware DRS?

DRS stands for Distributed Resource Scheduler; that automatically balances

available resources among various hosts by using cluster or resource pools. With
the help of HA, DRS can move VMs from one host to another to balance the available
resources among VMs.

What is share, limit, and reservation?

Share: A value that specifies the relative priority or importance of a VM access to

given resource.

Limit: Consumption of a CPU cycle or host physical memory that cannot cross the
defined value (limit).

Reservation: This value defines in the form of CPU or memory and must be available
for a VM to start.

What are the alarms why we use them?

An alarm is a notification which appears when an event occurs. Many default alarms
exist for many inventory objects. Alarms can be created and modified using vSphere
Web Client;

What are the hot-pluggable devices which can be added while VM is running?

We can add HDDs and NIC while VM is running.

What is a Template?
When a VM is converted into a format which can be used to create a VM with pre-
defined settings is called a template. An installed VM can be converted into a
template but it cannot be powered-on.

What is Snapshot?

To create a copy of a VM with the timestamp as a restore point is called a

snapshot. Snapshots are taken when an upgrade or software installation is required.
For better performance, a snapshot should be removed after a particular task is
performed.

How to convert a physical machine into a VM?

Three steps are required to convert a physical machine to a VM:

An agent needs to be installed on the Physical machine

VI client needs to be installed with Converter Plug-in
A server to import/export virtual machines

What is vMotion and what is the main purpose to use it in a virtual

environment?

It is a very prominent feature of VMware vSphere used to live migrate running VMs
from one ESXi host to another without any downtime. Datastores and ESXi hosts both
can be used while vMotion.

What is the difference between a clone and a template?

A clone is a copy of a virtual machine. By cloning a VM, it will save time if

multiple VMs with the same configurations are required to configure. While a
template is a master copy of an image created from a VM which can be later used to
create many clones. After converting a VM to a template, it can’t be powered-on or
edited.

What monitoring method is used in vSphere HA?

Network Heartbeat
Datastore Heartbeat

How is master host elected in vSphere HA?

When HA is enabled in a cluster, all hosts take part in a selection process to be

selected as a master host. A host which has the highest number of datastores
mounted will be selected as a master host. All other hosts will remain slave hosts.

What is the purpose of VMware Tools?

It is a suite of utilities which are used to enhance the performance of a VM in the

form of graphics, mouse/keyboard movement, network card, and other peripheral
devices.

What is VMware DPM?

Stands for Distributed Power Management is a feature of VMware DRS is used to

monitor required resources in a cluster. When the resources are decreases due to
low usage, VMware DPM consolidates workloads and shut down the hosts which are not
being used, and when resources are increased it automatically power on the un-used
hosts.
 What is the ESXi Shell?

It is a command-line interface is used to run repair and diagnostics of ESXi hosts.

It can be accessed via DCUI, vCenter Server enable/disable, and via SSH.

How to run ESXTOP on ESXi host?

To run ESXTOP on an ESXi host, we’ll need two pre-requisites:

Install vSphere Client on a host where you want to configure

Enable SSH from DCUI by using “Troubleshooting Options” link