HP Integrity Virtual Machines Release Notes Version A.03.50

7 Networking Information
This chapter contains notes about configuring networks for virtual machines.
7.1 Supported Adapters
Integrity VM supports only those adapters that are of Ethernet or the IEEE 802.3 CSMA/CD
network. Note that AVIO interfaces are supported by a select set of Ethernet host NICs. For a
list of the specific AVIO supported NICs, see the HP Integrity Virtual Machines Installation,
Configuration, and Administration A.03.50 manual.
7.2 Sufficient Memory for Guests with Virtual LAN Devices
If the guest is configured with a number of virtual LAN devices and the guest does not have
sufficient memory, some of the devices could be missing after the guest is booted. To resolve
this issue, increase the size of guest memory with the hpvmmodify -r command.
7.3 Vswitches Are Always in SHARED Mode
The hpvmnet command displays the status of the vswitches, including the mode. The vswitches
are always in SHARED mode. No other modes are supported at this time.
7.4 Do Not Use the HP A5506B PCI 10/100Base-TX 4 Port Interface for
Virtual Networking
Host to guest connectivity might not be reliable when using the HP A5506B PCI 10/100Base-TX
4 Port interface for guest networking.
7.5 MAC Address Validation Can Be Enhanced
When you add a virtual NIC to your guest, Integrity VM checks to make sure the MAC address
is unique.
By default, Integrity VM makes three attempts (each with a one-second timeout) to determine
the validity of the MAC address for the virtual NIC. This process can result in up to ten seconds
of delay for each defined virtual NIC. To speed up this processing, add the following tunable to
the /etc/rc.config.d/hpvmconf configuration file:
HPVMMACADDRFRAMES=n
Where n is the number of attempts (1 to 30). The default is 3. A value of 1 or 2 increases
performance at the risk of missing a response from a slow NIC.
You can set the HPVMMACADDRFRAMES tunable to zero (0), which completely eliminates the MAC
address verification. However, HP recommends that you do so only after you configure all of
your guests and confirm that there are no conflicts with MAC addresses in your network
environment.
To boost virtual network performance, create additional vswitches and allocate them across
guests.
7.6 Auto Port Aggregation (APA) is Supported on the VM Host, Not on
the Guest
Integrity VM does not support running APA on a guest. You can run APA on the VM Host.
APA can be configured on the VM Host to provide a highly available LAN for the vswitch (APA
in active/passive mode) or to increase the bandwidth of the vswitch LAN (APA active/active
7.1 Supported Adapters 55