VMware Distributed Switch Design for Enterprise Clusters

VMware Distributed Switch Design

vSphere Distributed Switch (VDS) centralizes network management across the entire cluster. This guide covers production design patterns.

VDS vs Standard Switch

Feature	Standard vSwitch	Distributed vSwitch
Management	Per-host	Centralized
Port groups	Per-host	Cluster-wide
LACP	No	Yes
NetFlow	No	Yes
LLDP	No	Yes
Traffic shaping	Ingress	Ingress + Egress

VDS Design for Enterprise

TEXT

VDS-Production
├── dvPortGroup-Management     (VLAN 99, teaming: active-standby)
├── dvPortGroup-vMotion        (VLAN 100, jumbo frames MTU 9000)
├── dvPortGroup-vSAN           (VLAN 101, jumbo frames MTU 9000)
├── dvPortGroup-VM-Corporate   (VLAN 10, load balance: route by port ID)
├── dvPortGroup-VM-DMZ         (VLAN 20, promiscuous mode off)
└── dvPortGroup-iSCSI          (VLAN 102, dedicated VMNIC)

LACP Configuration

POWERSHELL

# PowerCLI - Create LACP LAG
$vds = Get-VDSwitch "VDS-Production"
New-VDLacpGroup -VDSwitch $vds -Name "LAG1" -Mode Active -LoadBalancingMode LoadBalanceSrcDestIpTcpUdpPortVlan

Traffic Shaping for VM Networks

TEXT

dvPortGroup Properties → Traffic Shaping:
- Ingress: Average 1000 Mbit/s, Peak 2000 Mbit/s, Burst 512 MB
- Egress: Average 500 Mbit/s, Peak 1000 Mbit/s

NIC Teaming Policy

Different policies for different traffic types:

Management: Active/Standby (predictable, one active NIC)
vMotion: Load balance by IP hash (needs LACP on switch)
VM traffic: Route based on originating virtual port (no LACP needed)
iSCSI: Multi-pathing with one VMkernel per NIC

MTU for vMotion and vSAN

Always enable jumbo frames (MTU 9000) for vMotion and vSAN traffic. Requires physical switch ports also configured for MTU 9000.

POWERSHELL

# Verify VMkernel MTU
Get-VMHostNetworkAdapter -VMKernel | Select-Object Name, Mtu, VMotionEnabled, VsanEnabled