6.0.1

If packets are being dropped, adjust the virtual machine shares. If packets are not being dropped, check the
size of the network packets and the data receive and transfer rates. In general, the larger the network
packets, the faster the network speed. When the packet size is large, fewer packets are transferred, which
reduces the amount of CPU required to process the data. When network packets are small, more packets are
transferred but the network speed is slower because more CPU is required to process the data.
NOTE In some instances, large packets might result in high network latency. To check network latency, use
the VMware AppSpeed performance monitoring application or a third-party application.
If packets are not being dropped and the data receive rate is slow, the host is probably lacking the CPU
resources required to handle the load. Check the number of virtual machines assigned to each physical NIC.
If necessary, perform load balancing by moving virtual machines to different vSwitches or by adding more
NICs to the host. You can also move virtual machines to another host or increase the host CPU or virtual
machine CPU.
If you experience network-related performance problems, also consider taking the actions listed below.
Table 1‑73. Networking Performance Enhancement Advice
# Resolution
1 Verify that VMware Tools is installed on each virtual machine.
2 If possible, use vmxnet3 NIC drivers, which are available with VMware Tools. They are optimized for high
performance.
3 If virtual machines running on the same host communicate with each other, connect them to the same vSwitch to
avoid transferring packets over the physical network.
4 Assign each physical NIC to a port group and a vSwitch.
5 Use separate physical NICs to handle the different traffic streams, such as network packets generated by virtual
machines, iSCSI protocols, vMotion tasks.
6 Ensure that the physical NIC capacity is large enough to handle the network traffic on that vSwitch. If the capacity
is not enough, consider using a high-bandwidth physical NIC (10Gbps) or moving some virtual machines to a
vSwitch with a lighter load or to a new vSwitch.
7 If packets are being dropped at the vSwitch port, increase the virtual network driver ring buffers where applicable.
8 Verify that the reported speed and duplex settings for the physical NIC match the hardware expectations and that
the hardware is configured to run at its maximum capability. For example, verify that NICs with 1Gbps are not
reset to 100Mbps because they are connected to an older switch.
9 Verify that all NICs are running in full duplex mode. Hardware connectivity problems might result in a NIC
resetting itself to a lower speed or half duplex mode.
10 Use vNICs that are TCP Segmentation Offload (TSO)-capable, and verify that TSO-Jumbo Frames are enabled
where possible.
Network (Mbps)
The Network (Mbps) chart displays network usage for the 10 virtual machines on the host with the most
network usage.
This chart is located in the Virtual Machines view of the host Performance tab.
vSphere Monitoring and Performance
56 VMware, Inc.