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Connecting a NAS storage directly to an ESXi Server

Dear VMware/Network Experts,

I have a VMware Esxi 6 Server wich has 4gigabit network ports.
The one is used for connecting the server to the network (under VLAN).

So my native Lan is 192.168.1.1
and the VLAN network that the ESXi Server is connected is 192.168.100.1

I have also a NAS storage with 2gigabit ports with IP 192.168.100.5
but unfortunately it is not visible from the Server when connected to the switch.
The NAS should be used for backup.

Q1)Is it possible to connect the NAS directly to the ESXi Server’s network ports ?
Q2)Is it possible to connect both gigabit ports to the ESXi Server in order to have an uplink/downlink of 2gigabit in total?
Q3)What configuration should be required in the networking tab of the ESXi?

Thanks for your help,
Mamelas

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

Q1. Yes, you can do this with a direct cable.
Q2. Yes, you create a trunk on your physical switch, and setup teaming policy on the server correctly.
Q3. Depends what requirements you want, more than a single nic what switch are you using? You can leave the defaults, and often this will work correctly.

You need to check, if you can pin the NAS IP Address, and also more importantly vmkping the NAS IP Address from your ESXi console.

Also you must also create a VMKernel Portgroup for iSCSI or NFS traffic.

mamelas

ASKER

Dear Andrew,

Regarding Q1, you mean direct ftp cable or plain one?

Regarding Q2, the storage has 2 network ports so I am referring to connecting the 2 ports storage
directly to the ESXi in order to gain read/write speed. Is that possible and how?

Regarding Q3, I would like to know what should I configure between storage and ESXi in order the storage to be visible from the VMs.

Thanks in advance,
Mamelas

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

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mamelas

ASKER

Thank you Andrew. I will follow your suggestions!!