Deploying Windows vCenter with External PSCs in Enhanced Linked Mode: Part 2

Gene Torres Leave a comment
Before following any steps in here, be sure to refer to the previous part to this series, which will provide some background information and walk through the steps to install the first PSC and vCenter servers.  The steps contained in this post will be a continuation, marking the differences between the initial install (previous post), and the additional PSC and vCenter server.
In this post, I will be walking through joining the second PSC to the SSO domain created previously.  Following that, if there are any steps different for the subsequent vCenter Server installation, I will call out any steps in this installation that differ from the first install and include screenshots.
For any pre-requisites, head to Part 1 of this series.

 

Install the Second Platform Services Controller on a Windows Machine and Joining the SSO Domain

If deploying in a production environment, refer to the vSphere Installation and Setup for vSphere 6.0 Guide.

    1. Launch the vCenter Server Installer
    2. Select vCenter Server for Windows, and click Install.
    3. Click Next on the welcome screen.
    4. Accept the EULA, click Next.
    5. Under External Deployment, select Platform Services Controller, and click Next.external_psc_part2_1_5
    6. Verify the system name (recommended you use FQDN, not IP Address), and click Next.
    7. Select Join a vCenter Single Sign-On domain.
    8. Enter the FQDN for the first Platform Services Controller that owns the SSO domain you want to join.
    9. Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On password, then click Next.external_psc_part2_1_9
    10. When prompted for Certificate Validation, click OK to accept the self-signed certificate.
    11. Select Join an existing site, choose the site from the drop-down menu (should match the site name of the first PSC you created), and click Next.external_psc_part2_1_11
    12. On the Configure Ports page, make any changes necessary for your environment, and click Next.
    13. Set the PSC installation and data directories, and click Next.
    14. Select whether or not to join the Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP), and click Next.
    15. Verify the installation summary settings, and if all looks well, click Install.

Next Steps

 
Once completed, run the installer on the vCenter Server that will connect to this PSC, and be sure to connect it to THIS PSC, NOT THE FIRST PSC that was built.

external_psc_part2_1_ns_1

Install vCenter Server and the vCenter Server Components, Connecting to the Second PSC

Perform these steps, making sure to connect this vCenter to the PSC that was just installed above, not the first PSC from Part 1.
Installation
 
  1. Launch the vCenter installer and select vCenter Server for Windows. Click Install.
  2. Once the installer initializes, click Next.
  3. Accept the VMware End User License Agreement, and click Next.
  4. Under External Deployment, select vCenter Server and click Next.
  5. Enter the system’s FQDN, and click Next.
  6. Enter the information for the external PSC that was deployed in the section above, and click Next.  This step will register the vCenter with the PSC.
  7. When prompted for certificate validation, click OK to approve the self-signed certificate created by the PSC.
  8. Configure the vCenter service account according to your environment requirements and click Next.  If you are using an external database server, you will need to specify a user service account.

    Note:     If you are using a user service account, you will need to make sure it has the “log on as a service” privilege in the local security policy.

  9. Select your database deployment and enter information if necessary, then click Next.
  10. Configure the required ports if necessary to match your environment, and click Next.
  11. Configure the installation directory for the vCenter Server and data, then click Next.
  12. Review all settings, and when ready, click Install.
Next Steps
 
After you’ve completed this setup, you should now have a functional topology, with 2 vCenters each connected to an external platform services controller.  The two external PSCs should now also be running in enhanced linked mode, and to verify, you can log into either vCenter, and see that you can also manage the inventory of the other.
I will follow this up with my testing for vCenter repointing and recovering from a failed PSC in this topology.
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Deploying Windows vCenter with External PSCs in Enhanced Linked Mode: Part 1

Gene Torres 1 Comment

In many cases for small environments, it makes sense to deploy a vCenter Appliance with an embedded Platform Services Controller.  In larger environments with multiple sites, although you can (doesn’t mean you should) manage remote hosts with a single vCenter, it may make more sense to deploy a vCenter in each site, or region to further increase availability.  Furthermore, by configuring Enhanced Linked Mode, you can make management simpler by being able to link vCenter systems and replicate roles, permissions, licenses, policies, and tags; instead of having vCenter servers which are all managed individually.

Enhanced Linked Mode not only allows you to connect Windows vCenters, or just vCenter Server appliances; you can have an environment where Windows vCenters as well as vCenter Appliances can be linked together.  That said – there are supported and unsupported topologies, which is beyond the scope of this, however, you can find the information for those topologies in this VMware KB Article.

The following procedure is my re-creation of our production topology in a test environment.  The steps will walk through standard installation and configuration of the vCenter servers and PSCs in Enhanced Linked mode to get a to a usable state.  The follow-up post to this will be related to Installing the second PSC and vCenter, linking to the SSO domain and site created in this how-to.

Disclaimer:  The following information and procedures are performed in an isolated environment, and I am building these with the absolute minimum requirements since my test environment is a single physical host that also hosts other test machines in use by another engineer.  If performing these steps in production, be sure to follow proper sizing best practices, and built to suit your particular environment using the resource links provided throughout the article.

Hardware Requirements: vCenter Server for Windows

Before we get into the installation procedure, here’s an idea of what I’m building and the topology I will be using.

(All servers listed below are running Windows Server 2012 R2)

  • 1 Active Directory Domain Controller
  • 1 Single Sign-On Domain
  • 2 Sites (simulated)
  • 2 External Platform Services Controllers (one for each site)
  • 2 vCenter Servers (one for each site)

external_psc_diagram_1

 

Install a Platform Services Controller on a Windows Host

 

If deploying in a production environment, refer to the vSphere Installation and Setup for vSphere 6.0 Guide.
Pre-requisites
  • Verify system meets the minimum HW/SW requirements
  • Download the vCenter Server Installer
  • Install Adobe Flash Player version 11.9 or later if you will be running using the vSphere Web Client from one of the host machines.
  • Forward and Reverse DNS entries should be created for each system prior to installation.

 

Installation

  1. Launch the vCenter installer and select vCenter Server for Windows. Click Install.

    external_psc_part1_1_1

  2. Once the installer initializes, click Next.
  3. Accept the VMware End User License Agreement, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_1_3

  4. Under External Deployment, select Platform Services Controller and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_1_4

  5. Enter the system’s FQDN, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_1_5

  6. If this is the first PSC being created, create a new Single Sign-On Domain, set the password, provide the site name, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_1_6

  7. Configure the ports as needed (I left this at the defaults, as I have no need to change them), then click Next.

    external_psc_part1_1_7

  8. Change the installation and data directories as needed and click Next.  For my implementation, I kept the defaults, since this is not production.

    external_psc_part1_1_8

  9. Select whether or not you want to join the customer experience improvement program (CEIP), then click Next. Since this is an isolated environment with no external internet access, I unchecked it.

    external_psc_part1_1_9

  10. At the Ready to Install screen, verify settings, and if everything looks good, click Install.  When done, the installer will provide you with next steps (convenient!)

    external_psc_part1_1_10

 

Next Steps
 
Note: You must wait for the PSC installation to complete before moving to the next step.  VMware does not support concurrent installations of PSC and vCenter.

 

Install vCenter and the vCenter Components

 

  1. Launch the vCenter installer and select vCenter Server for Windows, then click Install.

    external_psc_part1_2_1

  2. Once the installer initializes, click Next.
  3. Accept the VMware End User License Agreement, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_3

  4. Under External Deployment, select vCenter Server and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_4

  5. Enter the system’s FQDN, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_5

  6. Enter the information for the external PSC that was deployed in the section above, and click Next.  This step will register the vCenter with the PSC.

    external_psc_part1_2_6

  7. When prompted for certificate validation, click OK to approve the self-signed certificate created by the PSC

    external_psc_part1_2_7

  8. Configure the vCenter service account according to your environment requirements and click Next.  If you are using an external database server, you will need to specify a user service account.

    Note: If you are using a user service account, you will need to make sure it has the “log on as a service” privilege in the local security policy.

    external_psc_part1_2_8

  9. Select your database deployment and enter information if necessary, then click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_9

  10. Configure the required ports if necessary to match your environment, and click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_10

  11. Configure the installation directory for the vCenter Server and data, then click Next.

    external_psc_part1_2_11

  12. Review all settings, and when ready, click Install.

    external_psc_part1_2_12

 

Next Steps
  • Configure vCenter to integrate with your Active Domain or LDAP server as needed.
  • Configure any group memberships, roles, permissions, licenses, etc…
  • Install the next PSC and be sure to join the existing Single Sign-On domain that you just created.  Following that, install the next vCenter, and you are done!
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SRM 6.1 POC Update & PSC Problems

Gene Torres Leave a comment

I recently ran into some problems during my first attempt at pairing the two sites in my SRM POC, which resulted in a failure, and some misleading error messages.  Since help on this was pretty scarce on the ‘net, I opened a case with VMware Support.  After about a week’s worth of troubleshooting – repairing the installation, re-installing SRM with a fresh database, and certificate regeneration/registration provided no resolution.

srm_psc_error_1

As I was waiting for an escalation from VMware, we discovered that one of the PSCs in this environment stopped replicating changes to the other. Upon further analysis, I discovered that it had been about a month since that particular platform service controller had stopped replicating changes. What made it tough to find the problem here was that we were still able to get into vCenter and manage it just fine, but taking a peek under the covers proved there was definitely an issue.  It was by chance a license change to vCenter exposed this problem when we saw that the change didn’t make it from one vCenter to the other.

The following command will provide you with the results seen below, which indicate the synchronization problem:

On each PSC, run the following command from the vmdird directory: 

  • .\vdcrepadmin.exe -f showpartnerstatus -h localhost -u administrator -w [password]

Partner: psc1.domain.local
Host available: Yes
Status available: Yes
My last change number: 872590
Partner has seen my change number: 10846
Partner is 861744 changes behind.

Partner: psc2.domain.local
Host available: Yes
Status available: Yes
My last change number: 2147483197
Partner has seen my change number: 2147483197
Partner is 0 changes behind.

 

Since this had been discovered, the support engineer and I agreed that we should put the site recovery pairing on hold until the PSC issue was resolved, just so we didn’t have too many variables involved in our troubleshooting. To make a long story short, the PSC synchronization was the root cause of SRM not being able to pair the sites, and I’ve also written up a series on re-creating the environment in isolation, and performing the PSC replacement to provide the ultimate solution.

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VMware Site Recovery Manager 6.1 Diagram

Gene Torres 3 Comments

I wasn’t able to locate a complete diagram for SRM that included both the various services PLUS the communication ports, all rolled up into a deploy-able topology,  so I took it upon myself to gather the information I needed, and build something that would work for me as a reference tool as well as a conversation piece.

The design seen is an actual POC design I’m working with in a live enterprise network (sandbox vCenters and clusters). The result of it all is a topology diagram with vSphere and SRM ports and protocols baked right into it.

If you are interested in obtaining a PDF version of this diagram, click here.

SRM 6.2 2-site Topology
Resources

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