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VMware vSphere 7.0 support with Hitachi VSP Storage

By Paul Morrissey posted 04-02-2020 10:01

  
Today, VMware released vSphere 7.0 support into public domain.  Hitachi is happy to continue supporting current and next generation vSphere environments and we have been busy looking at 7.0 from the early builds.

vSphere 7.0 delivered some key advancements in storage and Jason@VMware covered many of the new storage related enhancements in vSphere 7.0 at his blog here

First, all Hitachi VSP Storage including all-flash NVMe systems have been certified for vSphere 7.0 including our recent VSP 5000 series which is NVMe data platform that customers are embracing and handily beating our projections. View the VMware compatibility guide (vCG ) for specifics. Regarding integrations into VMware management software ecosystem, some are supported today and others typically follow in the 90-120 day window after a major GA release but let me pick on some the areas that Jason referred to in his blog



vVols :-
vSphere 7.0 continues the vVols adoption train (you will notice that vVols is now front and center and matches branding with its lower "v")


We recently produced a vVols reference guide (quick start guide) to give customers the complete a-z for deploying and implementing vVols for a green field or brown field environment complete with copious screenshots. They wanted to understand how to deploy it from scratch to get a better understanding of everything involved versus just running that install script. You can view that guide at our VASA download location here 

Kubernetes Containers and Persistent Storage :-
We recently rolled out an architecture guide for using persistent cloud native storage (CNS) for containers. We covered 4 use cases include vVols, VMFS, vSAN and bare metal LUNs as persistent storage for kubernetes clusters. Review the guide here https://www.hitachivantara.com/en-us/pdfd/architecture-guide/deployment-options-for-kubernetes-container-applications-on-ucp-ci-with-vsp-series.pdf to see how simple it is to get persistent storage operational and take advantage of some uniqueness that Hitachi provides with storage policy based management. This was tested on our converged system and vSAN hyperconverged system (UCP CI and UCP HC) but applicable to generic compute with VSP Storage as well.

VCF :-
We continue to see strong interest in VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) with external storage. Hitachi provides a platform (UCP RS) for deploying VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) and customers can use VMFS/vVols as principal/supplemental storage to augment/supplant the vSAN storage that comes natively with VCF. I highly encourage to check out our VCF offering as the combination of VSP Storage with VMware integrations including UCP Advisor to provide lifecycle management of compute/network/storage is providing compelling outcomes.


SRM, Stretched Cluster (vMSC) and VSP Global Active Device (GAD)
This is one that falls into the 90 day window as we are currently certifying ESXi 7.0 with Stretched VSP Storage (aka GAD). I reference this as this is a configuration for both 2DC and more so lately with 3DC environments that I receive allot of inquires about. Continue to refer to our KB article for the latest updates in this area.

Automation and Operations with vRO/vROPS/vRLI
Per the earlier screenshot, we have a number of different offerings to enable automation from customers. So whether you favor vRealize Orchestrator, PowerShell or vCenter Plugin experience, they are being certified/updated as we speak for this release. We support vVols with current version of vROPS but looking forward to have an official support with vROPS 8.0 to rollout shortly.

More to come but congratulations to VMware on delivering another compelling major vSphere release. If you have specific questions, feel free to reach me @pmorrissey3000 on twitter or leave comment here.
 
 

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01-25-2021 07:34

vSphere 7 and GAD for vSphere HA, vMotion testing is complete and interoperability report is being published. vMSC testing is in progress with both HDLM and NMP PSP. In regards to your "does not work" with NMP/ALUA, can you elaborate. Note, if referring to observances with replication link simulated or remote site failures, we did observed differences with NMP and HDLM starting with releases higher than vSphere 6.5u2. I am waiting for details on our results with vSphere 7.0 to see if similar. Review the appendix section in our implementation guide for those details https://www.hitachivantara.com/en-us/pdf/architecture-guide/gad-vmware-vsphere-metro-storage-cluster-configuration-on-storage-implementation-guide.pdf

01-19-2021 08:00

me too

01-19-2021 07:54

I am also interested in an update. Especially since the period of 90-120 days has already passed.😕

In a customer situation it seems that vpshere 7.0 does not work properly with GAD, ALUA, Vsphere HA cluster and default multipath drivers from vmware.

12-16-2020 16:08

Any update on when  ESXi 7.0 with Stretched VSP Storage (aka GAD) will be certified?