6.0.1

Configuration Guidelines for Software FCoE
When seing up your network environment to work with ESXi software FCoE, follow the guidelines and
best practices that VMware oers.
Network Switch Guidelines
Follow these guidelines when you congure a network switch for software FCoE environment:
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On the ports that communicate with your ESXi host, disable the Spanning Tree Protocol (STP). Having
the STP enabled might delay the FCoE Initialization Protocol (FIP) response at the switch and cause an
all paths down (APD) condition.
The FIP is a protocol that FCoE uses to discover and initialize FCoE entities on the Ethernet.
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Turn on Priority-based Flow Control (PFC) and set it to AUTO.
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Make sure that you have a compatible rmware version on the FCoE switch.
Network Adapter Best Practices
If you plan to enable software FCoE adapters to work with network adapters, specic considerations apply.
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Make sure that the latest microcode is installed on the FCoE network adapter.
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If the network adapter has multiple ports, when conguring networking, add each port to a separate
vSwitch. This practice helps you to avoid an APD condition when a disruptive event, such as an MTU
change, occurs.
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Do not move a network adapter port from one vSwitch to another when FCoE trac is active. If you
need to make this change, reboot your host afterwards.
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If you changed the vSwitch for a network adapter port and caused a failure, moving the port back to the
original vSwitch resolves the problem.
Set Up Networking for Software FCoE
Before you activate the software FCoE adapters, you need to create VMkernel network adapters for all
physical FCoE NICs installed on your host.
This procedure explains how to create a single VMkernel network adapter connected to a single FCoE
physical network adapter through a vSphere standard switch. If your host has multiple network adapters or
multiple ports on the adapter, connect each FCoE NIC to a separate standard switch. For more information,
see the vSphere Networking documentation.
N ESXi supports the maximum of four network adapter ports used for software FCoE.
Procedure
1 Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
2 Click Actions > Add Networking.
3 Select VMkernel Network Adapter, and click Next.
4 Select New standard switch to create a vSphere standard switch.
5 Under Unclaimed Adapters, select the network adapter (vmnic#) that supports FCoE and click Assign.
Make sure to assign the adapter to Active Adapters.
vSphere Storage
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