I have to admit, I missed this in the release notes when we initially brought out 5.0U1. But it is rather neat that we now support routing NFS traffic.
There are some caveats however. From the release notes:
vSphere 5.0 Update 1 supports L3 routed NFS storage access when you ensure that your environment meets the following conditions:
- Use Cisco's Hot Standby Router Protocol (HSRP) in IP Router. If you are using non-Cisco router, be sure to use Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP) instead.
- Use Quality of Service (QoS) to prioritize NFS L3 traffic on networks with limited bandwidths, or on networks that experience congestion. See your router company documentation for details.
- Follow Routed NFS L3 best practices recommended by storage vendor. Contact your storage vendor for details.
- Disable Network I/O Resource Management (NetIORM)
- If you are planning to use systems with top-of-rack switches or switch-dependent I/O device partitioning, contact your system vendor for compatibility and support.
In an L3 environment the following additional restrictions are applicable:
- The environment does not support VMware Site Recovery Manager.
- The environment supports only NFS protocol. Do not use other storage protocols such as FCoE over the same physical network.
- The NFS traffic in this environment does not support IPv6.
- The NFS traffic in this environment can be routed only over a LAN. Other environments such as WAN are not supported.
- The environment does not support Distributed Virtual Switch (DVS).
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