Tutorial: 802.3ad Port Configuration with ESX

Just wanted to post a quick post about how to configure 802.3ad port consolidation with a Cisco switch and VMware ESX (vSphere was used for this example).  I was using an HP DL380 with 2 onboard NIC and 2 24 port Cisco 3750G connected with stackwise cables.

Switch Configuration:

…
interface GigabitEthernet1/0/14
description ESX NIC 2
switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q
switchport mode trunk
channel-group 1 mode on
end
…
interface GigabitEthernet2/0/14
description ESX NIC 2
switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q
switchport mode trunk
channel-group 1 mode on
end
…
interface Port-channel1
description ESX PortChannel
switchport trunk encapsulation dot1q
switchport mode trunk
end
…

What I did was group two gigabit ports (1/0/14 and 2/0/14) into one port channel group (1).  Then I applied the trunk settings to the port channel instead of the individual ports.  As for the ESX side, I configured the virtual switch with more than one active adapter and set the “load balancing” to “Route based on IP hash.”

If this set up would not have been using a trunk, the following configuration would have been used:

…
interface Port-channel1
description ESX PortChannel
switchport mode access
switchport access vlan <vlan for port group>
end
…

This configuration has seemed to be fairly reliable. I plan to do some load testing to investigate how balanced the load really is. I will post a follow-up if there are any interesting findings.