This is a quick blog to show the power of a protection domain in an AHV setup. First, I wanted to explain that my lab is not complex yet. Meaning I don’t have firewall rules, different VLANS, or any kind of segmentation. It’s a flat Network with 2 Nutanix AHV Host. When I started writing the blog, I was doing this on a production and DR site at a previous company. It worked like a treat, and I was able to move AHV virtual machines from different clusters to a DR cluster and back with no problem. But since then, I moved on to another company where they don’t have Nutanix :(. I don’t have access to the environment anymore. My lab is 100% AHV. Why? Well, because I got into Nutanix 2 years ago or more. I love what they offer and the Hypervisor’s easy use and other software they provide. I am using the Nutanix CE version. However, the Nutanix CE version is behind compared to what is released now. I noticed in an AOS 6.0 setup that some of the options are in different areas compared to the CE version. The CE version is based on 5.18, from what I can tell. I am not sure when they will release a newer build for the CE edition either at this time.
This allowed me to maintain base skills set in the Nutanix realm. I know it’s not 100% solution when compared to what many are running in a Prod setup. But It’s the same steps in a production environment. I am now rewriting this blog around my lab setup instead of what I originally had written up. Since I need to get my Virtual Machines off the other AHV host, I decided to write a little blog on protection domains VM replication. This blog shows you and gives you an idea of what it really can do. It is very straightforward. The biggest issue I had back when I was doing it in a Production setup was Firewalls. It is critical to make sure this is right. If not, you will struggle. Ask me how I know :). We all have to go through the firewall setups with Information Security or whoever manages your firewalls. Just make sure it’s set up correctly.
As I was saying above, my lab is simple. It is just for me to test things and keep up to date with my CVADS/CVAD journey.
In my lab, I will be referring to names called:
NTX-Cluster-03
NTX-Cluster-01
I created two Single Node Clusters, so I can have the option to do failovers and try to mirror a source and destination AHV cluster.
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I was in a situation where I needed to get another Lab server. So after searching online, I found a great site called Refurbished/Used Dell & HP Servers, Hard Disk Drives – TechMikeNY
I ended up ordering this. This is all I needed for my second host at this time.
Items | Qty | Subtotal | |
Dell PowerEdge R630 8-Bay 2.5″ 1U ServerDELL_PE_R630_8B | 1 | $364.00 | |
Dell 0C34X6 2TB SSD SATA 2.5” 6Gbps Solid State Drive2TB_SSD_SATA_SFF_6G | 2 | $408.50 | |
Intel Xeon E5-2698 v3 2.30GHz 16-Core LGA 2011 / Socket R-3 Processor SR1XE2-30Ghz_E5-2698_V3_16C | 2 | $245.60 | |
32GB PC4-2133P ECC-Registered Server Memory RAM32GB_PC4-2133P | 8 | $683.20 | |
Dell 1100W 80+ Platinum Power SupplyDELL_1100W_80-PLUS | 2 | $153.80 | |
Dell iDRAC8 Enterprise Remote Access LicenseiDRAC8_Enterprise | 1 | $67.20 | |
Dell HBA330 12Gbps SAS HBA Controller (NON-RAID) MiniCardHBA330_Mini | 1 | $62.70 | |
200GB SSD SATA 2.5” 6Gbps Solid State Drive200GB_SSD_SATA_SFF_6G | 2 | $73.30 | |
Dell 0R1XFC I350 Quad-Port 1GBe Daughter CardDELL_0R1XFC | 1 | $21.00 | |
64GB SATA Disk-On-Module SATADOM SATA III 6Gbps Drive64GB_SATADOM_6G | 1 | $15.50 | |
Dell 2.5in R-Series CaddyR-Series_SFF_Caddies | 4 | $19.00 |
Subtotal | $2,113.80 |
Discount | -$0.00 |
Shipping | $55.60 |
GST | $0.00 |
Grand total | $2,169.40 |
@TechMikeNY
Here are the firewall Ports
Ports and Protocols ANY – Disaster Recovery – Protection Domain (nutanix.com)
Protection Domains (nutanix.com)
You need to create a Protection domain to do this first. This is what tells Nutanix what to replication and how often.
Let’s start by setting up a protection domain on NTX-Cluster-01
Drop down, select data protection.
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Click + protection domain
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Please give it a name. Give it something that makes sense to what you are working with.
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Now it will ask you for the VM names.
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You can select what schedule fits you best in the setup. I set this up to run every day as an example. The 10 minutes in the screen show is to show you the schedule options.
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Now you need to add the Remote site (NTX-Cluster-03) to which you want it to send. You will do this on the source cluster and add the Remote location to the source cluster.
NTX-Cluster-01 >>>>>>> NTX-Cluster-03
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Once both sites are set up to talk to each other, we will need to come back here.
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Go to the remote Site Cluster and Log in.
Go to the Data Protection section.
Then create the new remote site connection.
NTX-Cluster-013 >>>>>>> NTX-Cluster-01 ( this is for reverse sync) Basically to replicate it back if needed. In my case, it’s not. But in a Prod setup, you would want to send it back once your DR failover activities are completed.
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Again once we get the sites talking I will come back here to update the mappings.
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Now to check the connections from NTX-Cluster-01 >>>>>>> NTX-Cluster-03
Now, as you can see, 03 is talking to 01
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Then you can see that 01 is talking to 03
NTX-Cluster-03 >>>>>>> NTX-Cluster-01
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Now let’s set the mappings. We can start on NTX-Cluster-01.
Go back to the Remote Site and edit “Update” the Remote site settings.
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Click on Settings, and scroll down.
Add the Network Mappings and vStore Name mappings. This is just setting up the Source and destination network and storage.
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On Cluster-01
So AHV: Data-Cluster01 will send to AHV: Data-Cluster-03
My network name is the same as the test sites. This would be different in your environment based on what you have the Network name when creating a base VLAN. I used the default storage location as well on both Clusters.
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NTX-Cluster-01
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Go back to the Remote Site (NTX-Cluster-03) and do the same but in reverse.
On NTX-Cluster-03
So AHV: Data-Cluster03 will send to AHV: Data-Cluster-01
My network name is the same as the test sites.
Save settings
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NTX-Cluster-03 updated with the remote site info.
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Replication has started
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On the remote tab, you can see the data completed along with start times, and then it shows outgoing.
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Now, if I log into my “remote site” NTX-Cluster-03
I should see incoming and some stats. You can see it listing NTX-Cluster-01 as the remote site. This is because we are logged into NTX-Cluster-03.
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Now it’s done:
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I would like to migrate the server from NTX-Cluster-01 to NTX-Cluster-03.
Go to the source Prism Element, and click on the Async DR tab. Then click Migrate option.
Now click on Migrate.
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As you can see, it’s gone from the Prod location
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Check the Remote location or DR NTX-Cluster-03, and you will see it now.
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Now let’s power it one.
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Up and online
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Now, in this case, I am going to migrate it back.
NTX-Cluster-03>>>>>>>NTX-Cluster-01
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Now it will, Snapshot the VM and send it back to NTX-Cluster-01.
Now let’s check NTX-Cluster-01 and it’s back.
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In the next example, I need to move most of my lab VMs from NXT-Cluster-01 to NXT-Cluster-03 to free up resources on a host.
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I selected more this time.
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This time around, I will let the schedule do what it needs to do. This will give you an idea of how it works.
Starts at 5 pm, and now it’s 4:53 pm.
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At 5 pm we will see a local snapshot start, then it will start replicating to NTX-Cluster-03.
Snapshot Started
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Replication started.
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Finished
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Now to fail them over.
Click on Async DR, The Protection Domain name, Entities.
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Click Migrate
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They’re gone and now on NTX-Cluster-03.
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I am powering them up now.
They are all online.
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Working
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I hope you find this helpful if you want to play around with Protection domains. As I stated above, this is in my lab. But I have used this in a production environment to move workloads around. I mainly used this to move resources from one cluster to another in preparation for a data center migration involving a CVAD setup. It worked like a charm and saved me big time in areas where this was needed.
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