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Table Of Contents
Route Based on Physical NIC Load
Route Based on Physical NIC Load is based on Route Based on Originating Virtual Port, where the virtual
switch checks the actual load of the uplinks and takes steps to reduce it on overloaded uplinks. Available
only for vSphere Distributed Switch.
The distributed switch calculates uplinks for virtual machines by taking their port ID and the number of
uplinks in the NIC team. The distributed switch tests the uplinks every 30 seconds, and if their load
exceeds 75 percent of usage, the port ID of the virtual machine with the highest I/O is moved to a different
uplink.
Table 85. Considerations on Using Route Based on Physical NIC Load
Considerations Description
Advantages
n
Low resource consumption because the distributed switch
calculates uplinks for virtual machines only once and
checking the of uplinks has minimal impact.
n
The distributed switch is aware of the load of uplinks and
takes care to reduce it if needed.
n
No changes on the physical switch are required.
Disadvantages
n
The bandwidth that is available to virtual machines is limited
to the uplinks that are connected to the distributed switch.
Use Explicit Failover Order
No actual load balancing is available with this policy. The virtual switch always uses the uplink that stands
first in the list of Active adapters from the failover order and that passes failover detection criteria. If no
uplinks in the Active list are available, the virtual switch uses the uplinks from the Standby list.
Configure NIC Teaming, Failover, and Load Balancing on a
vSphere Standard Switch or Standard Port Group
Include two or more physical NICs in a team to increase the network capacity of a vSphere Standard
Switch or standard port group. Configure failover order to determine how network traffic is rerouted in
case of adapter failure. Select a load balancing algorithm to determine how the standard switch
distributes the traffic between the physical NICs in a team.
Configure NIC teaming, failover, and load balancing depending on the network configuration on the
physical switch and the topology of the standard switch. See Teaming and Failover Policy and Load
Balancing Algorithms Available for Virtual Switches for more information.
If you configure the teaming and failover policy on a standard switch, the policy is propagated to all port
groups in the switch. If you configure the policy on a standard port group, it overrides the policy inherited
from the switch.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Web Client, navigate to the host.
2 On the Configure tab, expand Networking and select Virtual switches.
vSphere Networking
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