Users Guide

Network services

• DNS server(s): An external DNS server is required for production use. (It is not required in a completely

isolated environment). When you configure EVO:RAIL, specify the IP address of your corporate DNS

servers. Also, provide the EVO:RAIL or vCenter Server, vCenter Log Insight, and ESXi host names and

IP addresses in corporate DNS server tables.

• NTP server(s): An external NTP server is not required, but it is recommended. If you do not provide an

NTP server, EVO:RAIL uses the time that is set on ESXi host #1 (regardless whether or not this time is

correct).

• Active Directory (AD): (Optional) To use Active Directory, type the AD user name, AD password, and

AD domain. EVO:RAIL does not fully configure AD. Perform more tasks on the vSphere Web Client.

Networking best practices

• All network traffic (except for out-of-band management) is on the 10 GbE NICs. Each node in an

EVO:RAIL appliance has two 10 GbE network ports. Each port must be connected to a 10 GbE switch

that supports IPv4 and IPv6 multicast.

• EVO:RAIL supports four types of traffic network — Management, vSphere vMotion, Virtual SAN, and

Virtual Machine. We recommend traffic isolation on separate VLANs. The following table lists the

traffic isolation.

Table 4. Interfaces for traffic

Network VMNIC0 VMNIC1

vSphere vMotion Active Standby

Virtual SAN Standby Active

Virtual Machines Active Standby

EVO:RAIL management Active Standby

vCenter Server or ESXi

management

Active Standby

• To ensure vSphere vMotion traffic does not consume all available bandwidth on the 10 GbE port,

EVO:RAIL limits vMotion traffic to 4 Gbps.

• If you plan to scale up to four EVO:RAIL appliances in a cluster over time when you configure the first

appliance, allocate all 16 IP addresses to the ESXi, vMotion, and Virtual SAN IP pools. EVO:RAIL

appliance enables configuring subsequent appliances even easier.

• Dell recommends you to use a redundant switching solution for high availability. When using multiple

TOR switches, multicast traffic for IPv4 and IPv6 must be able to communicate between the switches.

• It is not mandatory that all your network must support IPv6 because it applies only to the switches

connected to EVO:RAIL.

• Various network topologies for TOR switches and VLANs are possible with EVO:RAIL. The following

are sample scenarios that are provided in order of complexity, starting with the simplest:

a. One TOR switch on a flat network (no VLANs)

b. One TOR switch and multiple VLANs

c. Two TOR switches on a flat network (no VLANs)

d. Multiple TOR switches and multiple VLAN