How best to deploy 24 new hosts?

WoodiE

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jan 28, 2003
Messages
231
In about 2-3 weeks time I will be receiving 24 new blades across 3 new chassis. Each blade consists of 4x E5-4640, 1.5TB RAM, 200GB SSD SAS, and 2x 2GB SD cards.

My idea is to use the SD cards to install ESXi 5.5 U2, and maybe use the SSD for some sort of caching if possible (we use FC storage), but my main concern is how to best deploy 24 new hosts.

In the past I've only had to install 2,3,4, maybe 5 hosts at once so doing the install and config manually wasn't been a huge deal. I also have a script that I can use to copy the configuration (vswitches, time, etc) from one host to another but I'd still have to manually install ESXi on each host.

I'm aware of Auto Deploy but have never used it and know nothing about PowerCLI.

That said I'm not against trying to learn it in a short time but want to make sure I'm not over looking other possible solutions.

What are your thoughts about this?
 
Auto deploy or you could possibly copy the SD card once a single host has been installed but not configured.
 
Don't use Autodeploy. These would be stateless ESXi hosts, not installed to the SD cards. It's a bear to manage.

You could install ESXi in the same way you would Linux by PXE booting and using a kickstart script. But if you're not familiar with doing so, it'll take some time to set up, configure, and test.

Otherwise you can install each manually with an ISO and use Host Profiles to quickly configure them.
 
COW, if he is wanting to run ESXi from the SD cards how is the host stateless? (Bear with me. Lack of sleep and lack of coffee.)
 
I believe Autodeploy traditionally meant stateless by definition.

Per this, 5.1 added stateful autodeploy installs.

More info.

Have never used it, so correct me if I am wrong.

Do you have Enterprise Plus licensing? If not, that is going to limit your options.
 
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Looks like I'm going to be playing around with Auto Cache for the next several days.

Thanks for the suggestions.
 
I assume you have enterprise plus licenses?
If not, that's an easy killer for Auto Deploy. Also, Host profiles are evil...

My suggestion is to PXE boot a custom ISO that selects the SD to install to.
If you can use the PXE method, you can avoid hitting the console and configuring the Management IP for every host.

Worse case...if your network admin does not allow PXE, you could mount up an ISO via HP iLO or KVM Console via Cisco... "Virtual media or CD."

Nicholas Farmer
@vmnick0
 
Yes we have enterprise plus licenses.

@Nicholas, if not using Auto Deploy and host profiles, how would PXE booting directly to an ISO be any better?
 
I can rebuild 200-300 hosts (blades) in a single day.
This includes:
- Placing hosts into MMode,
- Rebooting and booting to a PXE server
- Having a special PXE image/iso that "clean" installs the ESXi image with extra drivers/vibs, console IP etc...
- I then use PowerCLI and vCenter API calls to reconnect the host to vcenter
- Reconnect the host to all virtual Distributed Switch objects
- Run all needed configurations to the host to get it up to Prod level...
--- This is the trick here, I have a fully build script that is like a host profile but does not require MMode or a reboot to throw on a host. The script takes three minutes to prep the host and then remove it from Maintenance Mode.

Once the host is back into production, VMs migrate to it, and I start on the next batch... MMode more hosts in the cluster, PXE, API build, back into prod... next..

The unattended PXE building and using PowerCLI to reconfigure the hosts in vCenter saves tons of time.

Keep this one thing in mind...
When you plan to go from 5.1 to 5.5 Or.. 5.5 to v6 and all of your Host profiles need "fixing" you will wish you went the PXE + Powercli profile method.

As with all things... If your network team does not allow you to PXE boot, because not allowing an access config with your vmnic0 trunk, or not allowing you to setup a very small Linux VM to let you pxe..., then this whole things breaks down.

Nicholas Farmer
@vmnick0
 
@Nicholas - I agree with you regarding your hesitation about using Host Profiles. I have used them back in the 5.0 days and noticed some quirkiness. That said it seems Auto Deploy uses them a lot and while I'm certainly not a PowerCLI guy - if you have any links or additional information regarding how to achieve what you've done I would appreciate it.

As far as PXE boot, I'm working on that now. At this point in time working on getting Auto Deploy setup and the PXE boot seems to be working but the TFTP server doesn't seem to be responding so that's another road block.

Thanks!
 
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