Hyperconverged InfrastructureFD

These materials are © 2023 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Any dissemination, distribution, or unauthorized use is strictly prohibited.

Hyperconverged
Infrastructure
These materials are © 2023 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Any dissemination, distribution, or unauthorized use is strictly prohibited.
Hyperconverged
Infrastructure
VMware 2nd Special Edition
by Lawrence Miller
Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies®,
VMware 2nd Special Edition
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION................................................................................................ 1
About This Book.................................................................................... 2
Foolish Assumptions............................................................................. 2
Icons Used in This Book........................................................................ 3
Beyond the Book................................................................................... 3
CHAPTER 1: Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved................ 5

Recognizing the Business Imperative................................................. 5
Exploring Key Trends............................................................................ 6
Adoption of multi-cloud.................................................................. 6
Cloud-native technologies.............................................................. 6
Living on the edge............................................................................ 7
Evolving storage landscape............................................................ 7
Adapting with New Strategies.............................................................. 8
Traditional storage infrastructure is complex.............................. 8
Multi-cloud environments are here to stay.................................. 9
Applications are everywhere.......................................................... 9
The high cost of existing solutions limits IT investment........... 10
CHAPTER 2: Understanding Hyperconverged

Infrastructure................................................................................ 11
Defining Hyperconverged Infrastructure......................................... 11
Understanding How Hyperconverged Infrastructure Works......... 13
Discovering What You Can Do with Hyperconverged
Infrastructure....................................................................................... 14
Defining the Elements of Success in Hyperconverged
Infrastructure....................................................................................... 14
A proven hypervisor...................................................................... 15
Simple-to-use storage................................................................... 15
A unified management platform................................................. 16
Flexible deployment choices........................................................ 16
Multi-Cloud capabilities................................................................. 16
CHAPTER 3: Recognizing Why You Need

Hyperconverged Infrastructure..................................... 19
Fast and Flexible Scaling..................................................................... 19
Operational Simplicity........................................................................ 20
Table of Contents v
Lower Total Cost of Ownership......................................................... 20
Centralized Management................................................................... 21
Multi-Cloud and Edge Support.......................................................... 22
Future-Proofing Your IT Investment................................................. 23
CHAPTER 4: Exploring Use Cases.................................................................. 25

Mission-Critical Applications.............................................................. 25
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure........................................................... 26
Modern Applications........................................................................... 26
Edge Deployments.............................................................................. 27
Multi-Cloud........................................................................................... 28
Disaster Recovery................................................................................ 29
CHAPTER 5: Getting Started with Your Deployment................... 31

Hyperconverged Infrastructure Certified Hardware....................... 31
Turnkey HCI Appliances...................................................................... 32
Hyperconverged Infrastructure as a Service................................... 33
On-Premises Hyperconverged Infrastructure as a Service............ 34
CHAPTER 6: Taking the Next Step to Multi-cloud

with VMware HCI........................................................................ 37
vSAN: Virtualized Storage for vSphere.............................................. 37
vSphere Virtual Volumes.................................................................... 41
Cloud-Connected HCI: vSphere+ and vSAN+................................... 43
Developer Integration with Kubernetes and VMware Tanzu......... 47
Realizing the Benefits of VMware HCI............................................... 48
CHAPTER 7: Ten Reasons to Love VMware HCI

and VMware vSAN..................................................................... 51
Scale Easily........................................................................................... 51
Improve Responsiveness to Business Demands............................. 52
Reduce IT Costs................................................................................... 52
Integrate with the VMware Stack...................................................... 53
Take an Easy First Step toward a Software-Defined
Infrastructure....................................................................................... 53
Break Down Traditional Data Center Silos....................................... 54
Future-Proof Infrastructure............................................................... 54
Delivering Native Security.................................................................. 55
Enable a Multi-Cloud Platform........................................................... 56
Maximize Options with the Largest Hardware Ecosystem............ 56
vi Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition
Introduction
H
yperconverged infrastructure (HCI) replaces traditional,
external storage arrays, such as storage area networks
(SANs), and converges compute, storage, and storage
networking resources on industry-standard x86 servers, using
software to abstract and pool cluster resources with unified
management software.
Similar to public cloud, HCI can scale up, scale out, and scale
independently, so organizations can avoid expensive up-front
investments in purpose-built storage and storage networking and
scale incrementally as additional resources are needed. Through
continuous innovation, HCI future-proofs your infrastructure
investments and can extend beyond the core data center to the
edge and the public cloud by providing a common operational
model.
HCI is an ideal platform for managing traditional virtual machines

(VMs) and cloud-native applications. With HCI, you can build a
private cloud; deploy on-premises with lower costs, more control,
and better security; and choose from multiple hardware options
from certified vendors. You can also expand HCI to the pub-
lic cloud with an “as-a-service” managed option. HCI helps you
achieve a true hybrid cloud with a mix of VM- and container-based
applications deployed across data center, public cloud, and edge
environments.
HCI increases business agility with automation, reducing the need

for manual intervention for common tasks, while eliminating silos
and increasing the performance of business-critical applications
to support faster decision making. HCI provides a platform that
enables centralized management across any environment. This
consistency becomes paramount as deployments scale beyond
the traditional confines of the data center. A single control plane
allows effective management across core data center, edge, and
public cloud deployments.
Introduction 1
About This Book
Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special
Edition, consists of seven chapters that explore the following:
»» Business imperatives and key trends that are shaping the

data center of the future (Chapter 1)
»» What HCI is all about (Chapter 2)
»» Why your organization needs HCI (Chapter 3)
»» Common HCI use cases (Chapter 4)
»» How to get started with your HCI deployment (Chapter 5)
»» What the VMware HCI portfolio offers (Chapter 6)
»» Ten Reasons to love VMware HCI and vSAN (Chapter 7)
Each chapter is written to stand on its own, so if you see a topic
that piques your interest, feel free to jump ahead to that chapter.
You can read this book in any order that suits you, though I don’t
recommend reading it upside down or backward.
Foolish Assumptions
It has been said that most assumptions have outlived their use-
lessness, but I assume a few things nonetheless.
Mainly, I assume that you’re an infrastructure and operations

(I&O) decision maker or practitioner. Whether you’re a chief
information officer (CIO), chief technology officer (CTO), vice
president or director of infrastructure, information technology
(IT) or virtual infrastructure (VI) manager, IT or VI sysadmin, or
an enterprise architect, this book will help you understand how to
take your next step to multi-cloud with HCI.
If any of these assumptions describes you, then this is the book

for you! If none of these assumptions describes you, keep reading
anyway. It’s a great book and after reading it, you’ll be hyper-
excited about HCI!
2 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition
Icons Used in This Book
Throughout this book, I occasionally use special icons to call
attention to important information. Here’s what to expect:
This icon points out important information you should commit to

your nonvolatile memory, your gray matter, or your noggin.
This icon explains the jargon beneath the jargon and is the stuff
legends — well, legendary nerds — are made of.
Tips are appreciated, but never expected, and I sure hope you’ll
appreciate these useful nuggets of information.
Beyond the Book

There’s only so much I can cover in this short book, so if you find
yourself at the end of it wondering, “Where can I learn more?,” go to
www.vmware.com/products/hyper-converged-infrastructure.
html.
Introduction 3
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Looking at the impact of digital
transformation
»» Recognizing key trends
»» Simplifying storage infrastructure

to support multi-cloud and apps
everywhere
Chapter 1
Seeing How the Data
Center Has Evolved
T
his chapter explores how the traditional data center
has evolved — driven by digital transformation impera-
tives, multi-cloud strategies, cloud-native technologies,
and growing data storage requirements — and how enterprise
strategies need to change to support the changing business
environment.
Recognizing the Business Imperative

Digital transformation is driving the need for speed, and no com-
pany is exempt. Modern enterprises are under constant pressure
internally and externally to innovate faster and provide value
to the business. As the speed of technological change continues to
accelerate, companies need to focus on innovation and agility to
compete. Businesses that fail to adapt to the evolution of digital
technologies will be left behind, and their products or services are
likely to become obsolete.
CHAPTER 1 Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved 5
Exploring Key Trends
Several key trends are driving the need for a new approach to the
traditional data center, including broad adoption of multi-cloud
strategies, cloud-native technologies, and rapidly growing data
storage requirements.
Adoption of multi-cloud
Whether planned or purely the result of organic growth over time,
organizations have embraced a multi-cloud strategy. According to
the Flexera 2022 State of the Cloud Report, multi-cloud has become
the de facto standard, with 89 percent of respondents having a
multi-cloud strategy.
Multi-cloud strategies enable organizations to take advantage of

best-of-breed technologies and services offered across different
clouds — for example, software as a service (SaaS)–based appli-
cations hosted in different clouds for human resources, sales, and
marketing services; Amazon Web Services (AWS) for application
development; and Microsoft Azure for other business functions.
Multi-cloud consists of two or more public and/or private clouds.

A hybrid cloud is a mix of public and private cloud resources. All
hybrid clouds are multi-clouds, but not all multi-clouds are
hybrid clouds. The key difference is that a hybrid cloud provides
application and/or data portability across different cloud environ-
ments, whereas multi-cloud is simply two or more clouds that
may or may not be operating as siloed environments.
Cloud-native technologies
Multi-cloud is just one piece of the cloud trend. Early adopters of
cloud computing largely focused on SaaS applications and lift-
and-shift migrations of their on-premises workloads to infra-
structure as a service (IaaS) cloud environments to take advantage
of cloud benefits, including on-demand scalability and pay-as-
you-go consumption-based models.
Today, cloud-native technologies — such as containers, Kubernetes,

microservices architectures, serverless functions, and more — are
driving cloud-first strategies.
Living on the edge
Edge computing processes data closer to where it’s gener-
ated, instead of sending all the data to a centralized location for
processing. This allows for faster and more efficient data process-
ing, as well as reduced latency and bandwidth usage. For example,
instead of sending all the data from a security camera to a remote
server for analysis, edge computing would allow the camera to
process the data locally and send only relevant information to the
remote server.
With the rapid rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) and other edge
use cases, such as gaming and video streaming, almost half of
all data is expected to be created and processed at the edge. As
a result, more infrastructure is expected to be deployed at the
edge, eliminating much of the need for infrastructure tradition-
ally deployed in on-premises data centers.
Evolving storage landscape

In the enterprise information technology (IT) landscape, main-
taining an agile data center infrastructure tends to be a source
of headaches for IT leaders and administrators. Without funda-
mental changes, the pain will only get worse, as business moves
further into the world of digital everything. That’s because the
demands on infrastructure are exploding.
Multi-cloud, cloud-native, and the need for a more agile data

center have all increased the demand for storage resources. More
applications mean more data, which requires more storage. As
applications scale, the storage must scale with it, and when appli-
cations move across clouds, the storage must be able to follow.
Because of these realities, old storage architectures have a hard
time keeping up with the demands of the modern digital era. But
traditional storage infrastructure isn’t all wrong; it’s more of a
mixed bag:
»» On the upside: Modern storage arrays offer great capabili-

ties for storing, managing, and protecting data.
»» On the downside: Today’s storage arrays are largely worlds
unto themselves, like walled cities with their own cultures
and their own ways of doing things.
The enterprise storage model hasn’t changed much in the last
20 years: Providing storage services means acquiring dedicated
storage arrays and surrounding them with dedicated operating
teams. This model sometimes worked in the terabyte world, but
not in today’s petabyte and exabyte world.
The traditional enterprise storage model has many operational

shortcomings. For example:
»» Most organizations rely on purpose-built, dedicated

storage arrays. Each array has its own specialized function-
ality and operational procedures tied to the hardware and
not the applications or virtual machines (VMs).
»» Application needs and storage services aren’t aligned.
Application owners and virtualization administrators can’t
easily or precisely specify what they need and when they
need it. The result is either an inability to meet service-level
agreements (SLAs) for applications or overprovisioning of
storage capacity and services.
»» Operational workflows are stovepiped between storage,
application, and virtualization teams. Requests are made,
meetings are held, sticky notes are posted on monitors, work
is scheduled — and time is lost.
Clearly, traditional approaches to infrastructure fall far short of

today’s needs. We need an all-new approach. A software-defined
approach.
Adapting with New Strategies

Clearly, enterprises must adapt to the rapidly changing compet-
itive landscape. To become more agile and innovative, they must
modernize their data centers with a software-defined approach
that seamlessly extends the advantages of the public cloud to
their on-premises environments.
Traditional storage infrastructure

is complex
The traditional infrastructure model relies on proprietary,
purpose-built hardware for compute, storage, and networking.
These components form separate silos with their own management
software from numerous vendors. They work best when optimized
and managed by dedicated IT specialists. Furthermore, because
performance is set at the hardware layer, resources are typically
not properly optimized and overprovisioning often occurs.
Figure 1-1 shows the traditional approach as an expensive solu-

tion to a general-purpose IT need. It results in a larger data center
footprint, greater complexity, and more IT staffing and special-
ization. Worse, today’s dynamic applications and virtualized
workloads require provisioning flexibility that hardware-centric
approaches aren’t designed to deliver. It’s the opposite of simple
and streamlined.
FIGURE 1-1: Traditional silo-based infrastructure.
Multi-cloud environments
are here to stay
The multi-cloud trend shows no signs of letting up as orga-
nizations continue to adopt best-of-breed cloud solutions to
address their unique business requirements — regardless of
who the cloud provider is. This means that IT organizations
must adapt to this new paradigm and extend the efficiencies of
cloud operations to their on-premises data centers.
Applications are everywhere

Applications are key to successful digital transformation initia-
tives in the enterprise. These applications drive revenue, create
competitive differentiation, and empower employees and deci-
sion makers with advanced analytics and essential insights to
connect and engage with customers in real time. The applications
themselves are vast and include traditional enterprise applica-
tions such as email, database management systems (DBMSs),
enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, and big data, as well
as more specialized application such as electronic medical records
(EMRs), e-commerce, point of sale (POS) systems, directory ser-
vices, and security software tools.
These applications are increasingly being deployed and operated

across a diverse infrastructure landscape. The range of deploy-
ment options — from on-premises data centers and public clouds
to remote or branch locations — can present unique challenges.
A traditional, unvirtualized enterprise infrastructure typically

consists of physical compute, storage, and network resources
running in an on-premises data center. This traditional infra-
structure is managed by different teams using various tools oper-
ating in disparate silos. This complex operating model results in a
lack of cooperation and more friction across teams, costly redun-
dant resourcing, and greater risk in maintaining governance and
policies of the different parts of the stack.
To be successful, enterprise IT must proactively manage an ever-

growing portfolio of business applications, matching the needs
of each application to the underlying resources that support that
application.
The high cost of existing solutions

limits IT investment
Digital data is growing exponentially. IDC forecasts that, by
2025, the global datasphere will grow to 175 zettabytes (that’s
162 trillion gigabytes). For many organizations, data storage
is now the lion’s share of their IT spending. Given that reality,
it’s no surprise that as data sets grow from terabytes to exabytes,
storage efficiency is attracting more scrutiny from the business.
Additionally, end-user expectations are increasing because of the

widespread use of server virtualization, the rise of cloud-based
services, and the emergence of scale-out applications. End users
now expect better application performance and faster responsive-
ness from the IT services organization.
These expectations put more pressure on your IT team to evolve

to a modern infrastructure that simplifies compute, storage, net-
working, and management to deliver higher efficiency, lower
costs, and greater agility.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Learning the basics of hyperconverged
infrastructure
»» Discovering how hyperconverged

infrastructure works
»» Exploring common hyperconverged

infrastructure use cases
»» Looking at the key components of a

hyperconverged infrastructure solution
Chapter 2
Understanding
Hyperconverged
Infrastructure
T
his chapter explores some of the reasons hyperconverged
infrastructure (HCI) is such a hot topic in infrastructure
and operations (I&O) circles. You get a basic definition of
HCI, an explanation of how it all works, an overview of common
use cases, and a description of the key components in an HCI
solution.
Defining Hyperconverged Infrastructure

First, let’s lay out a basic definition. Hyperconverged infrastructure,
as shown in Figure 2-1, is a software-defined, unified system that
combines many of the elements of a traditional data center —
storage, compute, networking, and management — in virtual-
ized, standard x86 server hardware, enabling a building-block
approach to infrastructure with scale-out capabilities.
CHAPTER 2 Understanding Hyperconverged Infrastructure 11
FIGURE 2-1: Core HCI.
HCI originally included just virtual compute and virtual storage.

Full-stack HCI includes network virtualization, advanced man-
agement, and full life-cycle management for the virtualization
layer, delivering a complete software-defined data center (SDDC)
with cloud management to run enterprise apps — whether
traditional or containerized — in private and public, multi-cloud,
hybrid, and edge environments.
In HCI, all key data center functions run as software on the hyper-
visor in a tightly integrated software layer. HCI is fundamentally
about this architecture; as a result, there are different paths to the
same end — from turnkey appliances to flexible hardware plat-
forms installed with the HCI software. (I cover all these options
in Chapter 5.)
In an HCI environment, compute, storage, and management

resources are delivered through industry-standard x86 architec-
tures. The server platform runs a hypervisor and pools a variety
of flash storage devices — such as Non-Volatile Memory Express
(NVMe), Serial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS)
solid-state drives (SSDs), and Serial Advanced Technology
Attachment (SATA) SSDs — from across multiple servers in the
cluster to create shared storage, similar to traditional storage
area network (SAN) or network-attached storage (NAS) arrays.
Sometimes overlooked, a key here is that HCI doesn’t virtualize
or pool together storage from external storage systems like some
traditional storage virtualizations solutions do. The shared stor-
age is only composed of the storage devices in the server.
Understanding How Hyperconverged

Infrastructure Works
A hyperconverged platform has four tightly integrated software
components:
»» Storage virtualization
»» Compute virtualization
»» Networking virtualization
»» Advanced management, including automation
Virtualization software abstracts and pools resources and then
allocates them dynamically to applications in virtual machines
(VMs) or containers.
HCI runs both compute and storage virtualization on industry-

standard x86 servers, instead of running stand-alone servers for
compute resources and external arrays for storage resources. HCI
creates a pool of storage resources across multiple servers (as few
as two) and allocates storage to applications based on user inputs.
Usually with HCI, the same team that manages compute resources
also manages storage resources, so a single unified team can
quickly make decisions on resource provisioning instead of rely-
ing on a ticket-based system with infrastructure managed by dif-
ferent specialized information technology (IT) teams.
HCI software ensures that the data is protected in a number of

different ways, such as using redundant array of independent
disks (RAID) configurations, snapshots, and replication.
HCI runs on many different storage types, so customers can

choose a storage medium that best meets their needs in terms of
price and performance.
HCI provides data services that meet user needs for efficiency and
security, such as deduplication, compression, encryption, and
checksums.
Discovering What You Can Do with
Hyperconverged Infrastructure
Although not limited to these use cases, the benefits of HCI are
especially evident across these common use cases:
»» Mission-critical applications
»» Modern applications/containers
»» Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI)
»» Edge
»» Multi-cloud
»» Disaster recovery
Chapter 4 takes a deeper dive into these use cases.
Beyond these use cases, HCI supports different storage types

(including block, file, and object storage) to address your differ-
ent application workload requirements. Finally, HCI allows you to
manage all your IT operations centrally, extending control from
the core data center to remote locations, edge deployments, pub-
lic and private clouds, and hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
Defining the Elements of Success

in Hyperconverged Infrastructure
Building an HCI environment has a lot in common with making
a mouthwatering meal: Start with the best ingredients, com-
bine carefully, and use proven techniques for making everything
work together as a unified whole. The key ingredients for HCI
success are
»» A proven hypervisor
»» Simple-to-use storage
»» A unified management platform
»» Flexible deployment choices
»» Multi-cloud capabilities
A proven hypervisor
In an HCI solution, the hypervisor forms your foundation and
plays a key role in ensuring data availability, storage efficiency,
application performance, and flexible scalability.
Given that the benefits of virtualization — from operational effi-

ciency to increased availability — all stem from the hypervisor,
choosing the right hypervisor is critical. The more capable and
feature-rich your hypervisor, the better your results.
Simple-to-use storage
In a hyperconverged solution, storage and storage networking
are collapsed into the server and virtualized. This streamlines
operations, costs, and the overall physical footprint. HCI delivers
the performance, resiliency, and availability that organizations
require, and it also provides important data services — such as
deduplication, compression, encryption, and quality of service —
that are typical of modern storage systems.
However, not all approaches to software-defined storage in an HCI

environment are created equal. Next-generation HCI solutions
deliver extremely tight integration between the hypervisor and
storage virtualization software. The tight integration eliminates
the need for a separate virtual storage appliance deployed on each
server, which leads to lower resource utilization and lower VM
densities.
Unlike hardware-centric solutions, HCI software pools server-

attached storage to create high-performance, resilient, shared
storage that’s optimized for VMs and containers. What was pre-
viously complicated and expensive becomes just the opposite:
simple, powerful, streamlined, and intelligent.
The right storage solution can lower operational expenditure

(OpEx) by streamlining routine tasks, enabling better and more
predictable performance, and allowing your organization and
IT infrastructure to grow affordably without the need for large
capital investments. Capital expenditure (CapEx) costs are greatly
reduced by eliminating the need for purpose-built hardware and
storage networking silos.
A unified management platform
You’re now at the point in the recipe where you’ve virtualized your
infrastructure (compute, storage, and storage networking), which
means you’re halfway there! Next, you need a way to manage it.
When selecting a management solution, you’ll want to avoid cre-
ating a learning curve for users or, worse, multiple management
silos that you have to juggle when managing or monitoring the
different layers in the HCI.
What you want is a familiar interface, one you already know how
to use. And because simplicity and ease are also vital, look for a
unified platform that manages the entire stack and seamlessly
integrates all your workflows.
Flexible deployment choices

Software can’t run on software — you need to put it on some-
thing. To ease your path forward, look for an HCI platform that
gives you the broadest possible choices for the hardware plat-
form. This flexibility helps you build an HCI environment that
matches your needs and preferences exactly. It allows you to lev-
erage the x86 infrastructure you already know — cost-effective,
industry-standard, networking and storage products from a wide
variety of computer manufacturers. This means no new hardware
to learn, no new purchasing process, and no new support model
to navigate.
Multi-cloud capabilities
Multi-cloud architectures accelerate service delivery while reduc-
ing costs and business risk. Plus, they give lines of business and
IT the freedom to innovate using the best services from different
cloud providers, without lock-in.
Across all industries, organizations are embracing multi-cloud to:
»» Transform customer experience and growth

»» Scale the business while enabling product and service
innovation
»» Ensure employees can do their best work wherever they are
Many companies have successfully employed a multi-cloud strat-
egy to become more agile and improve operational efficiency. But
with opportunities come challenges.
According to VMware FY22 H2 Benchmark: Digital Momentum, nearly

one in four executives have concerns about the use of multiple
clouds, including:
»» Risk related to security, data, or privacy issues (25 percent)

»» Inconsistent infrastructure in application programming
interfaces (APIs), databases, networks, and security
(25 percent)
»» Need to hire or maintain new, specialized skills to support
public clouds (24 percent)
»» The ability to manage/optimize spend (23 percent)
»» Increased complexity from policies that manage individual
environments (23 percent)
Further, VMware FY22 Q3 Executive Pulse reports that 91 percent of

enterprise executives are looking to improve “consistency across
their public cloud environments.”
HCI extends on-premises I&O to any public cloud, enabling

organizations to run their enterprise applications with a consis-
tent operating model and a single unified management interface
across public clouds, data centers, and edge environments.
HCI provides centralized management from edge to core to cloud.

HCI can be extended to all the global hyperscalers, as well as
hundreds of regional public cloud providers.
A WORD TO THE WISE:

DON’T SCRIMP
Scrimping on your ingredients by settling for less than the best can
yield unsatisfactory results. Opting for initial cost savings or accepting
performance limits will be a decision you’ll likely regret sooner rather
than later. It’s important to consider the impact of your selection
beyond the HCI solution.
(continued)
(continued)
To that end, ask yourself the following questions:
• How will it integrate with your existing environment?

• What are the operational impacts?
• Can the solution efficiently and cost-effectively grow when, where,
and how you need it?
Choosing the best quality of your ingredients can help you avoid a
half-baked solution that leaves you with silos, vendor lock-in, expen-
sive upgrade and expansion paths, and unpredictable performance.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Scaling at your pace
»» Reducing complexity in storage

operations
»» Cutting capital and operational

expenditures
»» Managing everything in a unified console
»» Deploying to multi-cloud and edge cloud

environments
»» Ensuring your investment supports your

needs today and in the future
Chapter 3
Recognizing Why You
Need Hyperconverged
Infrastructure
T
his chapter explains some of the most compelling busi-
ness and technical benefits of hyperconverged infrastruc-
ture (HCI), including operational simplicity, lower total
cost of ownership (TCO), fast and flexible scaling, centralized
management, multi-cloud support, and future-proofing your IT
investment.
Fast and Flexible Scaling

With HCI, you can quickly scale in an elastic, nondisruptive man-
ner by taking advantage of x86 servers for storage:
»» Scale out: Capacity and compute can be scaled out at the

same time by adding a new host to the cluster.
CHAPTER 3 Recognizing Why You Need Hyperconverged Infrastructure 19
»» Scale up: Capacity can be scaled up independently merely
by adding new drives to the hosts.
This grow-as-you-go model provides both linear and granular

scaling in an affordable manner. Buy only what you need when
you need it, and spread out your investments over time.
HCI also provides the ability to scale storage-dense or storage-

only clusters that can provide storage to virtualized servers. This
compute/storage disaggregation capability delivers a shared stor-
age solution with the operational simplicity of HCI.
Operational Simplicity
One thing stands out when comparing HCI workflows with tradi-
tional storage workflows: There are far fewer steps, and they’re
usually done by far fewer people. This is intentional. HCI envi-
ronments are designed to be automated from the outset, not as
an afterthought. HCI provides ease of management with consis-
tent, simplified, and automated workflows for both enterprise
and modern applications — whether they run on-premises, in
a public or private cloud, or across hybrid, multi-cloud, or edge
environments.
Here’s an example of how HCI reduces operational complexity

and improves efficiency: Instead of carrying out the same storage
provisioning tasks over and over, you set policies and let software
do the job for you. Then make any necessary adjustments in stor-
age allocations over time. And even better, this can all be done
through familiar tools you already know and trust!
Lower Total Cost of Ownership

With HCI, you can cut costs by using standard x86 server
hardware as the basis for your storage systems. Off-the-shelf
hardware can cut acquisition costs and reduce ongoing mainte-
nance expenses, compared to the costs of buying and maintain-
ing proprietary solutions. The result is an overall drop in capital
expenditure (CapEx) and operational expenditure (OpEx) and
lower TCO.
HCI can help you greatly reduce infrastructure spending across
your data center. In particular, HCI:
»» Generates cost and storage efficiency

»» Leverages technical resources and expertise you already have
»» Eliminates overprovisioning with granular grow-as-you-go
scalability
Centralized Management
HCI transforms management and provisioning to make it all
about the application rather than the hardware.
In simple terms, HCI changes the management layer to allow

application requirements (not hardware resources) to drive your
storage decisions.
Historically, management of storage revolved around a rigid list

of requirements for capacity, performance, protection, and other
storage needs. These requirements were communicated from
one team to another, and then physically implemented as either
logical unit numbers (LUNs) or storage volumes. When they were
executed, there was little room for change. The requirements
were pretty much set in stone.
HCI rewrites this script. Application-centric storage policies

replace this hardware-centric approach. Storage policies are
associated with the virtual machines (VMs) that run an applica-
tion; these policies are automatically pushed down to the storage
layer for implementation and enforcement. Here’s the payoff:
»» Storage policies and the service levels they control are easily
and dynamically changed as an application goes through its
life cycle, moving from development and testing to rollout
and full production.
»» It’s far less wasteful than hardware-specific policies.
Applications get exactly the storage services they need, when
they need them, without routinely overprovisioning capacity
or data services.
»» HCI delivers a common standardized management approach
that works and spans across different storage types and
tiers. The policy-based management becomes a unified
command-and-control center for your storage environment.
You can manage the new hyperconverged storage architec-
ture, plus traditional storage solutions, such as storage area
networks (SANs) and network-attached storage (NAS), and
collect all the benefits of application-centric storage policies.
Next-generation HCI solutions deliver a new abstraction for stor-

age and a new control plane:
»» Abstraction can be implemented on traditional storage,

or you can implement an entirely new HCI architecture
that abstracts storage resources attached to x86 server
hardware.
»» The control plane is a new dynamic way to manage storage
services that are common across different types of storage.
Multi-Cloud and Edge Support

Multi-cloud architectures accelerate service delivery while reduc-
ing costs and business risk. Plus, they give lines of business and
IT the freedom to innovate using the best services from different
cloud providers, without lock-in.
Across all industries, organizations are embracing multi-cloud to:
»» Transform customer experience and growth

»» Scale the business while enabling product and service
innovation
»» Ensure employees can do their best work wherever they are
Companies that have embraced multi-cloud report significant
benefits. According to VMware FY22 H2 Benchmark: Digital Momen-
tum, benefits include the following:
»» Thirty-five percent revenue increase from faster modern

app delivery, demonstrating how much they’re transform-
ing customer experience
»» Forty-one percent less cost and fewer hours spent on IT
infrastructure — proof of successful product and service
delivery scaling at a lower cost
»» Thirty-five percent productivity savings across a
distributed workforce, further illustrating the success
reported between employee digital experience and
employee satisfaction
Likewise, edge use cases have grown rapidly over the past several
years to support remote office locations, mobile and remote work,
and other scenarios that require low-latency compute and storage
running as close to the end user as possible.
HCI can be deployed as infrastructure as a service (IaaS) across

multiple clouds include hyperscalers, private clouds, hybrid
clouds, and edge environments to support a wide array of busi-
ness use cases.
Future-Proofing Your IT Investment

In today’s technology-driven landscape, digital goods and ser-
vices drive modern business. Organizations across industries rely
on IT to provide them with the infrastructure needed to deliver
these digital experiences, meet changing demands, and maintain
a competitive edge. As time-to-market expectations accelerate
and greater numbers of mission-critical applications move out-
side the core data center, IT must evolve toward a cloud operat-
ing model to achieve the speed, agility, and cost advantages that
business leaders require.
The first step for many organizations is to adopt HCI, extending

the benefits of a cloud operational model to storage while opti-
mizing investments in existing tools and processes. HCI increases
agility, future-proofs infrastructure, and lowers storage costs.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Simplifying management of mission-
critical applications
»» Delivering a better user experience

in virtual desktop infrastructure
»» Running modern applications

on-premises and in the cloud
»» Supporting edge deployments
»» Enabling a multi-cloud strategy
»» Ensuring resiliency for disaster recovery
Chapter 4
Exploring Use Cases
I
n this chapter, you learn about some of the most common use
cases for hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) and real-world
VMware customer success stories.
Mission-Critical Applications
HCI has received substantial attention in recent years for innova-
tions that support emerging use cases, but from its inception, HCI
has successfully supported mission-critical applications across
all major industries.
Nonetheless, HCI vendors continue to enhance their platforms

with functions that further improve the performance, scalability,
and management of these applications.
CHAPTER 4 Exploring Use Cases 25
Whether running Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle databases,
Microsoft PostgreSQL, SAP HANA, or other critical applications,
HCI is now proven as a go-to deployment choice for organizations
looking to simplify their environments and optimize their work-
load experience.
For a relevant case study on JABLOTRON SECURITY, head to

www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/
pdf/customers/vmw-jablotron-customer-success-story.pdf.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

With so many end-user devices in play, the need for virtual desk-
top infrastructure (VDI) has grown, but traditional systems make
deployment a challenge. VDI requires a combination of high input/
output operations per second (IOPS) and low latency to ensure a
“just-like-physical” user experience. It also needs to require low
capital and operational costs to justify the return on investment
(ROI).
Using traditional infrastructure, VDI is expensive to deploy and

maintain, with high upfront capital expenditure (CapEx), as well
as the high maintenance costs necessary to provide adequate per-
formance and scale for virtual desktops and applications.
HCI delivers the perfect solution to these VDI challenges. It

provides a high-performance and low-cost solution for a more
consistent, predictable user experience, a lower CapEx require-
ment, and a simpler operational model.
For a relevant case study on Tianjin Denso Engine Electri-

cal Products Co., Ltd., head to www.vmware.com/content/dam/
digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/customers/vmware-
tianjin-denso-electric-case-study.pdf.
Modern Applications
Alongside the ongoing support for mission-critical workloads,
HCI has steadily evolved to support modern applications across
private, hybrid, and public clouds. These “cloud-native” appli-
cations are considered essential to digital transformation and
any modernization initiatives, whether designed to accelerate IT,
business, or both. Nearly any application is considered a modern
or cloud-native application if it has attributes generally associ-
ated with the concept, including the ability to be containerized,
automated, divided into microservices, or managed through
DevOps processes. Modern applications are typically built from
the ground up to support these capabilities, but legacy applica-
tions can also be rearchitected to bring them in line with modern
functionality.
More organizations are turning to HCI to consolidate applica-

tion deployment on a platform engineered for the nuances of
modern, cloud-native requirements. The rapid rise of containers
and Kubernetes deployments on HCI continues to help organiza-
tions with the broader modernization of their infrastructure. For
example, many organizations are now using HCI — along with
Kubernetes — to accelerate software updates, enable microser-
vices, ease deployment of stateless and stateful applications, shift
on-premises applications to public cloud environments, and more.
With HCI, this is all accomplished under the umbrella of unified
management for both virtual machines (VMs) and containers.
For a relevant case study on TechEdge, head to www.vmware.com/

content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/customers/
vmw-techedge-en-customer-case-study.pdf.
Edge Deployments
Edge IT — and its many variations, such as near-edge and far-
edge — is now established as a central piece of business strategy
as organizations of all sizes seek to capitalize on opportunities
beyond the walls of core data centers and major public cloud
regions. In turn, there is a growing selection of edge-centric
approaches and infrastructure designs, each with a unique set of
capabilities designed to supply the IT resources needed for remote
locations, such as capturing, analyzing, and storing data.
HCI is a perfect match for edge computing and remote office/

branch office deployment: It delivers a single, low-cost infra-
structure solution with integrated compute, storage, and net-
working with centralized management — reducing the need for
on-site IT staff. In addition, the right HCI solution can be easily
scaled up or down and is flexible enough to accommodate chang-
ing needs — exactly what companies with edge deployments and
remote offices need.
For a relevant case study on Modemakers, head to www.vmware.

com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/
customers/vmware-modemakers-casestudy.pdf.
Multi-Cloud
Multi-cloud is arguably the most challenging element of today’s IT
strategies, due primarily to difficulty in managing all the various
components in a typical deployment. In many organizations, these
environments are built incrementally over many years, which can
easily lead to siloed technologies that require specialized skills
and experience. This occurs for a multitude of reasons, beginning
with infrastructure (and associated management platforms) that
was designed for specific public clouds.
Another driver behind this splintered infrastructure reality is the

lack of consistent internal buy-in for multi-cloud due to differ-
ent requirements across teams. For example, DevOps might pre-
fer the services and technologies offered in Amazon Web Services
(AWS), whereas finance teams may require access to the SQL
Database services available in Microsoft Azure. The result is often
an assortment of specialized infrastructure and tools that are
complex and time-consuming to manage and not easily assem-
bled into a cohesive, unified data ecosystem.
Amid the ongoing struggle to build and support multi-cloud envi-

ronments, HCI has emerged as a logical choice for these deploy-
ments. Working with HCI’s inherently simplified, straightforward
design, leading HCI vendors have successfully created powerful —
yet easily managed — multi-cloud platforms that customers can
quickly deploy without the need for specialized skills. When inte-
grated natively with broader virtualization, container, and cloud
platforms, HCI not only becomes a one-stop shop for application
deployment across the enterprise, but also for flexible resource
deployment in any location, whether on-premises or in multiple
public and private clouds.
For a relevant case study on KIMS Hospitals, head to
www.
vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/
customers/vmw-support-cust-case-study.pdf.
Disaster Recovery
The cost of a disaster recovery (DR) site can be prohibitive for
many organizations. As a result, a number of businesses have an
inadequate or no disaster recovery plan, which introduces consid-
erable risk. One of the more significant costs of a disaster recovery
site is the IT systems infrastructure, including server hardware,
storage, and replication software.
Because HCI provides a complete, natively integrated platform

consisting of compute, network, and storage resources, it’s an
ideal solution for the disaster recovery use case. Deploy on inex-
pensive industry-standard x86 server components to remove
large, up-front investments. Because direct-attached drives are
used to create the shared storage, there is no dependency on
external shared storage hardware. This helps reduce the total cost
of the solution while providing sufficient capacity, reliability, and
performance.
Software-based replication can provide asynchronous VM repli-

cation with low recovery point objectives (RPOs). Replication can
be configured on a per-VM basis, enabling precise control over
which workloads are protected.
For a relevant case study on COLORAK, head to www.vmware.com/

content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/customers/
vmw-colorlak-en-case-study.pdf.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Exploring certified solutions
»» Turning to turnkey solutions
»» Consuming hyperconverged
infrastructure in the public cloud
»» Extending the public cloud to your

on-premises environment
Chapter 5
Getting Started with
Your Deployment
R
eady to put theory into practice? This chapter highlights the
different deployment options available to help you deploy
hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) on your terms and
timelines.
Certified Hardware
One of the main advantages of HCI is that you can deploy it on
standard x86 servers. But that doesn’t mean you can just throw
a bunch of hardware components together and expect it to magi-
cally work. A bit of engineering work goes into an HCI solution.
Fortunately, many vendors have created reference architectures
and compatibility guides for their various HCI solutions.
VMware offers HCI certified hardware as vSAN ReadyNodes —

more than 500 x86 servers, available from all the leading server
vendors, that have been preconfigured, tested, and certified to
run vSAN out of the box. Each ReadyNode is optimally config-
ured for vSAN with the required amount of central processing
CHAPTER 5 Getting Started with Your Deployment 31
unit (CPU), memory, network, input/output (I/O) controllers, and
storage, including solid-state drives (SSDs) and flash devices.
If you’re looking for local, enterprise-grade storage and compute

in a small, rugged package consider Edge ReadyNodes. Designed
to fit into the size of an airline carry-on, Edge ReadyNode servers
weight as little as 3.5 pounds and are ideal for military, maritime,
and other remote applications.
Key benefits of deploying on HCI-certified hardware include
»» Choice of hardware and server vendor: Choose from

many vendors to find the right fit for your data center in
terms of price, performance, and support.
»» Customization: HCI can run on any certified hardware, so
you can customize the cluster based on your specifications.
»» Licensing options: Select the software that best fits your
needs.
Choose a self-managed solution, such as HCI certified hardware

or turnkey HCI appliances (discussed in the next section), for pri-
vate cloud deployments and the flexibility to manage and operate
everything on your own.
Turnkey HCI Appliances

Although HCI certified hardware is a great option for do-it-
yourselfers, turnkey HCI appliances take ease of deployment to
another level. To simplify your IT operations and reduce risk,
choose a turnkey HCI appliance — the fastest way to adopt and
maintain HCI.
The Dell EMC VxRail jointly engineered solution is a turnkey

VMware HCI appliance that is fully integrated, preconfigured, and
pretested. Built on VMware vSphere and vSAN, VxRail delivers an
all-in-one IT infrastructure transformation solution by leverag-
ing a known and proven building block for the software-defined
data center (SDDC).
Key benefits of deploying on turnkey HCI appliances include
»» Integration: Appliances are fully integrated with your HCI

solution to deliver automated operations and simple
life-cycle management.
»» Support: Some vendors may offer higher levels of support
for hardware and software with an HCI appliance.
as a Service
To reap the full benefits of the public cloud, why not deploy your
HCI in the public cloud? HCI as a service enables organizations to
rapidly deploy to the cloud and enjoy “white-glove” service so
you can focus less on infrastructure management and more on
strategic initiatives.
VMware’s HCI as a service (HCIaaS) offerings are available across

all hyperscale public clouds and many other large public and
private cloud providers, including Amazon Web Services (AWS),
Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, IBM Cloud, and Oracle Cloud.
Key benefits of HCIaaS include
»» Consistent experience: Extend HCI to the public cloud for

a consistent experience.
»» Deployment speed: Faster speed of deployment and less
time spent managing infrastructure.
»» Application migration: Easier to migrate applications to a
public cloud environment with a consistent infrastructure
layer.
»» New HCI use cases: Unlock new use cases easier, such as
disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS).
Choose an as-a-service option to extend to public cloud for faster

speed of deployment and less time spent managing infrastructure.
On-Premises Hyperconverged
Infrastructure as a Service
For organizations that want to combine the simplicity and agility
of the public cloud with the security and control of on-premises
infrastructure, a fully managed hybrid cloud infrastructure as a
service (IaaS) platform may be your best option.
VMware on-premises HCI IaaS solutions include the following:
»» Dell Technologies Apex Cloud Services with VMware

Cloud: Dell Technlogies Apex Cloud Service with VMware
Cloud expands multi-cloud flexibility and security across
mulit-cloud environments with infrastructure as a service
powered by VMware Cloud. The Dell-managed infrastructure
as a service provides secure and consistent operations
across multiple cloud environments with integration for
VMware environments
»» Lenovo TruScale Hybrid Cloud with VMware: A fully
managed HCI cluster solution that hosts virtualized compute,
storage, and networking and combines the security of
on-premises infrastructure with hybrid cloud services. With
this hybrid cloud solution hosted on Lenovo’s ThinkAgile VX
HCI platform and VMware software, enterprises can benefit
from an as-a-service hybrid cloud for running their business
applications in a consumption-based price model.
Key benefits of on-premises HCI IaaS include
»» Reducing operational complexity and cost: Dramatically

simplify the management of data center services and edge
infrastructures with a fully managed, subscription-based,
service-based offering — all while significantly reducing your
total cost of ownership (TCO).
»» Accelerating innovation: With infrastructure that’s
supported end-to-end, IT admins can focus on product
innovation and differentiation.
»» Consistent operations and infrastructure: Support
enterprise workloads using familiar tools and processes,
and combine the simplicity and scalability of public cloud
with the security and control of private cloud.
Choose HCI IaaS for both private and public cloud deployments
delivered to your on-premises data center and edge locations.
DECIDING HOW TO DEPLOY

Having options is great, but how do you know which option to deploy?
Here are some key factors to consider when deciding on the best HCI
deployment option for your unique business needs:
• Location: Will you deploy in the public cloud or on-premises?

Centralized or at regional offices? For a simplified and standard-
ized footprint across multiple locations, consider an HCI appliance.
• Vendors: Are you satisfied with your existing vendors or
interested in working with new ones? Look for a vendor with a
large ecosystem of partnerships and integrations to maximize flex-
ibility and avoid vendor lock-in.
• Ongoing management: Will you manage the solution on your
own or seek a partner-managed solution? Do you prioritize simpli-
fied management and operations? For speed of deployment, flexi-
bility, and less time managing infrastructure, explore as-a-service
public cloud options. For private cloud, an HCI appliance can also
greatly simplify ongoing management.
• Use cases: Will HCI support virtual desktops or mission-critical
applications? Will you need enhanced storage or a high-performance
configuration? HCI appliances are highly configurable and can
handle any workload.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Laying the foundation for HCI with vSAN
»» Using existing storage with VMware

vSphere Virtual Volumes
»» Enabling multi-cloud with vSphere+

and vSAN+
»» Accelerating DevOps with Tanzu

integrations
»» Looking at VMware HCI benefits
Chapter 6
Taking the Next Step
to Multi-cloud with
VMware HCI
T
his chapter introduces you to the VMware hyperconverged
infrastructure (HCI) software stack and the advantages and
benefits of VMware HCI powered by vSAN.
vSAN: Virtualized Storage for vSphere

vSAN is VMware’s software-defined storage solution, built from
the ground up for vSphere virtual machines (VMs).
vSAN abstracts and aggregates locally attached drives in a vSphere

cluster to create a storage solution that can be provisioned and
managed from vCenter and the vSphere Client (see Figure 6-1).
vSAN doesn’t require the deployment of storage virtual appli-

ance or a controller VM. Instead, vSAN is natively integrated
in the vSphere hypervisor and typically consumes just a small
percentage of computing resources on each host (see Figure 6-2).
CHAPTER 6 Taking the Next Step to Multi-cloud with VMware HCI 37
FIGURE 6-1: The VMware HCI software stack.
FIGURE 6-2: vSAN is native in the vSphere hypervisor.
vSAN doesn’t compete with other VMs for resources, and the
input/output (I/O) path is shorter. A shorter I/O path and the
absence of resource-intensive virtual appliances enables vSAN
to provide excellent performance with minimal overhead. Higher
VM consolidation ratios translate into lower total cost of owner-
ship (TCO).
vSAN-backed HCI provides a wide array of deployment options
that span from a two-node setup to a standard cluster with the
ability to have up to 64 hosts in a cluster (see Figure 6-3).
FIGURE 6-3: A two-node cluster consists of two physical nodes in the

same location.
vSAN also accommodates a highly available solution topology

to serve as an active–active disaster recovery (DR) solution (see
Figure 6-4). vSAN includes the ability to share capacity across HCI
clusters, or share vSAN capacity to compute-only vSphere clusters,
called HCI Mesh, disaggregating storage and compute. This allows
greater flexibility to scale storage and compute independently.
FIGURE 6-4: A vSAN stretched cluster provides resiliency against the loss of

an entire site.
vSAN provides the scalability organizations need to rapidly
meet ever-changing business and IT requirements. VMware
vSAN enables organizations to move beyond large, scale-up
purchases to:
»» Scale out linearly by adding nodes to a cluster — starting as

small as two nodes and scaling incrementally — as compute
or storage resources are needed.
»» Scale up by adding storage capacity to existing nodes for
storage-dense HCI clusters.
»» Scale storage independently through disaggregation of compute
and storage resources with HCI Mesh. Users can create storage-
only clusters with HCI Mesh as a shared resource pool, or share
storage resources across HCI clusters, providing more flexibility
to scale resources as required.
vSAN integrates with the entire VMware stack, including features

such as vMotion, High Availability (HA), Distributed Resource
Scheduler (DRS), and more. VM storage provisioning and day-
to-day management of storage service-level agreements (SLAs)
can all be controlled through VM-level policies that can be set
and modified on the fly. vSAN delivers enterprise-class features,
scale, and performance, making it the ideal storage platform
for VMs.
vSAN EXPRESS STORAGE

ARCHITECTURE ENHANCEMENTS
In addition to all the benefits provided by vSAN, vSAN Express
Storage Architecture boasts enhancements to optimize next-
generation storage devices, including the following:
• Performance without trade-off: Store data using RAID6 at the

performance of RAID1. Achieve up to four times higher perfor-
mance while maintaining the highest levels of data protection
and space efficiency.
• Ready-for-anything resilience: By removing disk groups and
advancing to a storage pool construct, vSAN Express Storage
Architecture reduces failure domains and further improves
availability.
• Native data protection: Native snapshots within vSAN Express
Storage Architecture enable rapid data protection with up to
100 times faster operations. Seamlessly connect to third-party
backup solutions via an application programming interface (API)
for an easy-to-use experience to enhance data protection and
backup management.
• Lower storage costs with supreme resource and space
efficiency: Optimized compression methods deliver up to
four times better compression ratios and up to 70 percent extra
usable capacity, further improving space savings and efficiency.
• Resource-intensive workloads: Mission-critical applications,
database workloads, online transaction processing (OLTP),
DevOps, and edge deployments are ideal use cases for vSAN
Express Storage Architecture.
vSAN Express Storage Architecture’s single-tier architecture improves

storage efficiency, as all storage devices contribute to capacity, help-
ing to deliver up to 40 percent lower TCO. Organizations can also
expect up to 70 percent extra usable capacity with Express Storage
Architecture.
vSphere Virtual Volumes

VMware vSphere Virtual Volumes (vVols) is a storage area net-
work (SAN)/network-attached storage (NAS) management and
integration framework that exposes virtual disks as native stor-
age objects and enables array-based operations at the virtual disk
level.
vVols transform the data plane of SAN/NAS devices by align-

ing storage consumptions and operations with the VM. In other
words, vVols make SAN/NAS devices VM-aware and unlocks the
ability to leverage array-based data services with a VM-centric
approach at the granularity of a single virtual disk.
vVols allows organizations to leverage the unique capabilities of

their current storage investments and transition without disrup-
tion to a simpler and more efficient operational model optimized
for virtual environments that work across all storage types.
The vVols architecture is shown in Figure 6-5. Key elements of
vVols include the following:
»» Flexible consumption at the logical level: vVols virtualize

SAN and NAS devices by abstracting physical hardware
resources into logical pools of capacity (called a Virtual
Datastore) that can be flexibly consumed and configured
to span a portion of or several storage arrays. The Virtual
Datastore defines capacity boundaries and access logic and
exposes a set of data services accessible to VMs provisioned
in the pool. Virtual Datastores are purely logical constructs
that may be configured on the fly, when needed, without
disruption and don’t require file system formatting.
»» Precise control at the VM level: vVols define a new virtual
disk container that is independent of the underlying physical
storage representation, such as logical unit number (LUN),
file system, object, and so on. In other terms, with vVols the
virtual disk becomes the primary unit of data management
at the array level. This turns the Virtual Datastore into a
VM-centric pool of capacity. It becomes possible to execute
storage operations with VM granularity and to provision
native array-based data services to individual VMs. This
allows admins to provide the right storage service levels
to each VM.
»» Efficient operations through automation: Storage
Policy-Based Management (SPBM) allows capturing storage
service-level requirements, such as capacity, performance, or
availability, in the form of logical templates (policies) to which
VMs are associated. SPBM automates VM placement by
identifying available data stores that meet policy require-
ments; coupled with vVols, it dynamically instantiates
necessary data services. Through policy enforcement, SPBM
also automates service-level monitoring and compliance
throughout the life cycle of the VM.
»» Automated protection and granular recovery: Site
recovery manager (SRM) support for VVols brings granular
recovery of array-based replication, automated protection,
and enhanced storage policy-based management to
recovery plans. With vVols and SRM, organizations can
create independent vVols replication groups/SRM protec-
tion groups for a single VM, application, or group of VMs.
Additionally, each replication group/protection group
can have different recovery point objectives (RPOs) and all
groups use array-based replication.
»» Container mobility and storage-based policy manage-
ment (SBPM): Kubernetes Cloud Native Storage (CNS) vVols
support allows for mobility of containers and enables your
existing storage array capabilities to be managed via SPBM
policies. These policies can be applied at a VM or VM disk
level, all while existing in a single vVols data store that
correlates to a storage container on the array.
FIGURE 6-5: vVols architecture.
Cloud-Connected HCI: vSphere+

and vSAN+
As organizations increasingly embrace multi-cloud, workloads
continue to proliferate everywhere. Each workload has its own set
of requirements, which defines its optimal deployment location.
As a result, most enterprises have workloads running in multiple
clouds, as well as on-premises — as traditional infrastructure, as
private clouds, or hosted by third parties.
Organizations continue to run certain workloads on-premises for

a variety of reasons, including low latency, predictable perfor-
mance, data sovereignty, and others. However, these on-premises
workloads miss out on many cloud innovations, including admin-
istrator services for reduced operational burden, developer ser-
vices to accelerate application development, and simple but
flexible consumption-based pay-as-you-go models.
VMware vSphere+, the multi-cloud workload platform, deliv-

ers benefits of the cloud to on-premises workloads. vSphere+
combines industry-leading virtualization, an enterprise-ready
Kubernetes environment, and high-value cloud services to trans-
form existing on-premises deployments into software as a ser-
vice (SaaS)–enabled infrastructure that can help organizations
centralize management, supercharge productivity, and accelerate
innovation.
Building upon the advanced technology within the latest version

of vSphere Enterprise Plus edition, vSphere+ provides access to
a wide selection of cloud services and centralizes management
through the VMware Cloud Console (see Figure 6-6). Workloads
remain on-premises, running on ESXi hosts orchestrated by
vCenter instances, just like traditional vSphere today. But now,
vCenter can connect to the Cloud Console through a VMware cloud
gateway, allowing metadata to be collected and used to centrally
manage the entire distributed vSphere+ estate. Admin services
can then be used to simplify global operations, developer services
can be used to manage the Kubernetes environment, and optional
add-on hybrid cloud services can be purchased to extend the
capabilities of vSphere+ even further.
FIGURE 6-6: vSphere+ delivers the benefits of cloud to on-premises workloads.
vSAN+ connects all vCenter instances (at your discretion) to
VMware Cloud for centralized management (see Figure 6-7).
A vCenter cloud gateway virtual appliance is installed on-premises
and connects with vCenter to collect the minimal data needed for
display within the VMware Cloud Console. Through this console,
organizations can see their entire HCI estate; centrally monitor
events, alerts, and resource capacity; and identify unaddressed
security deficiencies. You can also update vCenter instances with
minimal impact, in just a few minutes, reducing the operational
effort and maintenance window required.
FIGURE 6-7: HCI powered by VMware vSAN+.
Services that accelerate administrator tasks include
»» Global Inventory Service: Provide a visual inventory of HCI

resources across multiple vCenters.
»» Event View Service: Quickly triage areas that need attention
across the entire HCI estate.
»» Lifecycle Management Service: Update vCenter instances
with minimal impact. Reduced maintenance window makes
it easier to schedule updates sooner, allowing more rapid
access to new features. If there is a problem, you can easily
roll back the update. Address security vulnerabilities quickly.
»» Provision a VM Service: Quickly create VMs within any
managed cluster to an existing vSAN data store.
Using vSphere+ together with vSAN+, IT admins and application
developers will more easily be able to build, run, manage, pro-
tect, and secure their traditional and next-gen workloads. Both
vSphere+ and vSAN+ are available through a flexible subscription-
based plans.
HYPERSCALE PUBLIC CLOUD:

FRIEND OR FOE?
Strategic discussions with VMware Cloud Provider partners sooner or
later focus on the role of hyperscale public cloud providers and their
impact on a provider’s strategy. These hyperscale public clouds have
rapidly expanded in scale, service scope, and regional availability up
to a point, today, where they’re a constant and significant part of any
enterprise IT strategy.
The term hyperscale or hyperscaler is usually understood to encom-

pass at least the three largest providers — Amazon Web Services
(AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Microsoft Azure — as well
as other global providers like Alibaba Cloud, IBM Cloud, Oracle Cloud,
and more. They all share similar characteristics, including global avail-
ability, a broad range of services beyond infrastructure, consumable
via a comprehensive API, and a partner channel model, among
others.
The first set of these characteristics are usually considered potential

threats to regional VMware Cloud Provider partners, but the last one,
using a partner channel model, must be considered an opportunity
from a strategic perspective.
The threat of these hyperscale public clouds entering any given

regional market puts them in a competitive position against any
existing partner. In many instances, this competition is based on
a cost advantage through extensive economies of scale, as well as
a portfolio breadth that is difficult for any existing provider in the
market to match.
VMware Cloud Providers can effectively address this competitive

threat by matching hyperscale public cloud costs for raw service infra-
structure and pricing through scalable software-defined platforms
and operations. And they can focus on differentiation through under-
standing customer needs, data sovereignty, and managed and profes-
sional services that are not available from hyperscale public clouds.
Whichever competitive strategy is chosen, hyperscale public cloud
provider channel partner models also offer an important opportunity
for VMware Cloud Provider partners. They provide access to
geographic regions that are hardly addressable via internal resources,
offer access to a new portfolio of services, and allow the expansion
of a VMware Cloud Provider’s value-added services business based
on the familiar VMware software stack. This situation leads to
“coopetition”: the duality of competition and cooperation between
two market actors. For most VMware Cloud Providers today,
coopetition is becoming a very common relationship toward
hyperscale public cloud providers. Earlier strategic discussions with
providers often focused on how to compete with the new entrants by
relying on existing business conditions and models, but a strategic
shift is now happening in most regions toward an expansion of the
established business model that builds on the opportunities offered
from hyperscale public cloud provider cooperation.
Developer Integration with Kubernetes

and VMware Tanzu
vSphere+ goes beyond VMs and brings containers to the fingertips
of your developers, enabling them to bypass ticketing systems
and get the infrastructure resources they need to build applica-
tions through a Kubernetes API surface.
With vSphere+, organizations can transform their existing vSphere-

based infrastructure into an enterprise-ready Kubernetes envi-
ronment, unifying VMs and containers on a single platform with
developer services that include (see Figure 6-8):
»» Tanzu Kubernetes Grid service: Run your containerized

applications on a certified Kubernetes distribution, inte-
grated with vSphere, using your existing tooling and
workflows to give developers on-demand access to
conformant Kubernetes clusters on-premises.
»» VM service: Create VMs using Kubernetes commands and
APIs, useful when building apps that include a combination
of VMs and containers.
FIGURE 6-8: vSphere+ integrated developer services.
»» Network service: Allows developers to manage virtual

routers, load balancers, and firewall rules. Configure,
monitor, and administer switching access for VMs and
Kubernetes workloads.
»» Storage service: Allows developers to manage persistent
disks for use with containers, Kubernetes, and VMs. Deploy
existing block and file storage infrastructure for container-
ized workloads.
»» Tanzu integrated services: Streamlines the deployment
and management of local and in-cluster platform services,
such as logging, registry, monitoring, and ingress, to easily
configure and maintain a production-ready Kubernetes
environment.
»» Tanzu Mission Control Essentials: Enables developers and
DevOps teams to centralize platform operations and
manage multiple Kubernetes clusters with observability,
troubleshooting, and resiliency.
Realizing the Benefits of VMware HCI

VMware HCI delivers key benefits for organizations, including the
following:
»» Broadest flexibility: VMware offers five times more

hardware choices than any other HCI vendor across all
15 major original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and
the broadest set of deployment options on the market.
»» Seamless evolution to full-stack HCI: VMware vSAN
powers the modernization journey at your own pace and
guides your journey through three key phases: starting with
core HCI powered by vSAN, evolving to full-stack HCI to build
a completely automated private cloud, and then extending
to hybrid or multi-cloud with a consistent operating model.
»» Intrinsic security: With vSAN encryption, organizations can
deploy the storage hardware of their choice, avoiding the
premium charged for self-encrypting drives (SEDs). vSAN
encryption is for both data at rest and in flight and is
completely hardware-agnostic.
»» Multi-cloud capabilities: VMware HCI is the fastest,
simplest way to bring the public cloud to your data center
and provide consistent, powerful management across hybrid
and multi-cloud environments.
»» Performance without trade-offs: vSAN ESA delivers up
to four times higher performance with consistency and
scalability and high-performant redundant array of indepen-
dent disks (RAID) — storing data in RAID 5/6 format with the
performance of RAID 1. It also provides enterprise-grade
snapshots with negligible performance impact — even with
deep snapshot chains.
VMware HCI: YOUR PATH

TO MODERNIZATION
As the digital economy continues to accelerate, companies need to
modernize their infrastructure. VMware solutions enable organiza-
tions to undertake the journey to modernization — from core HCI
to hybrid/multi-cloud — at their own pace:
• Core HCI: Manage compute and storage as one to enable greater

operational agility.
• Full-stack HCI: VMware Cloud Foundation powered by
vSAN. Build a completely automated private cloud.
• Hybrid cloud/multi-cloud: Connect private and public cloud envi-
ronments, based on the same HCI software stack with a consistent
operating model and architecture on-premises and in the cloud to
support traditional and modern, cloud-native applications.
IN THIS CHAPTER
»» Improving scalability and responsiveness
»» Reducing costs and leveraging native

integrations
»» Building a software-defined
infrastructure
»» Breaking down silos and future-proofing

your investments
»» Delivering native security and enabling

multi-cloud strategies
»» Maximizing your options with the largest

hardware vendor ecosystem
Chapter 7
Ten Reasons to Love
VMware HCI and
VMware vSAN
W
e’ve saved the best for last. Here’s the payoff for hyper-
converged infrastructure (HCI): really good outcomes
for both business and information technology (IT).
Scale Easily
With VMware HCI and vSAN, you can scale in an elastic, nondis-
ruptive manner by taking advantage of x86 servers for storage:
»» Scale out: Capacity and performance can be scaled out at

the same time by adding a new host to the cluster.
CHAPTER 7 Ten Reasons to Love VMware HCI and VMware vSAN 51
»» Scale up: Capacity and performance can be scaled up
independently, merely by adding new drives to the caching
layer or the capacity layer — or both.
VMware vSAN HCI Mesh maximizes flexibility and business agil-

ity by enabling organizations to easily scale out, scale up, or add
compute or storage independently. Turn to Chapter 6 to learn
more about the capabilities and benefits of HCI Mesh.
This grow-as-you-go model provides both linear and granular

scaling in an affordable manner. Buy only what you need when
you need it, and spread out your investments over time.
With the large choice of hardware platforms available for vSAN,

you can also choose from the various server form factors availa-
ble. Choose from traditional server design to the latest compos-
able infrastructure from the leading vendors to best match your
HCI environment with your application needs.
Improve Responsiveness
to Business Demands
With a data center built around HCI, your IT organization is poised
to rapidly respond to changing business demands. To deliver this
agility and flexibility, HCI:
»» Policy-based storage management allows storage to quickly

adapt to changing requirements
»» Enables a future-proof IT environment, with support for
today’s traditional applications, as well as new cloud-native
applications and container technologies
»» Allows you to scale up and scale out to easily meet specific
application needs
Reduce IT Costs
With HCI, you can cut costs by using standards-based server
hardware as the basis for your storage systems. Off-the-shelf
hardware can cut acquisition costs and reduce ongoing operational
(including real estate, power, and cooling) and maintenance
expenses, compared to the costs of buying and maintaining pro-
prietary solutions. The result is an overall drop in capital expen-
diture (CapEx) and operational expenditure (OpEx).
VMware vSAN reduces total cost of ownership (TCO) by more than

45 percent, including a 62 percent reduction in CapEx through
server-based storage and software-provided data services and a
50 percent reduction in time spent provisioning and managing
storage.
Integrate with the VMware Stack

Because vSAN is embedded inside the vSphere kernel, vSAN can
deliver the highest levels of performance without taxing the cen-
tral processing unit (CPU) with additional overhead. In addition,
the native architecture simplifies management and eliminates
risk associated with extra components and points of integra-
tion. This is a major difference from the many virtualized storage
appliances that run separately on top of the hypervisor.
Take an Easy First Step toward

a Software-Defined Infrastructure
The software-defined data center (SDDC) promises to change
how IT services are delivered. What was once static, inflexible,
and inefficient becomes dynamic, agile, and optimized. In other
words, the SDDC builds on the success of server virtualization to
evolve the data center from the past to the future.
In this new, software-defined world, all IT infrastructure elements

(including compute, storage, management, and networking) are
virtualized and delivered as a service on industry-standard serv-
ers and components. Resources are automatically deployed, with
little (or no) human involvement. Everything is highly automated,
controlled by software, and governed by policies that incorporate
the logic of business requirements for IT.
vSAN is the only VMware vSphere embedded storage solution.
vSAN runs on standard x86 servers, making it the easiest path to
a software-defined HCI infrastructure and hybrid cloud.
HCI is the natural evolution of data center architectures. This

ongoing evolution first moved us from traditional silo-based
infrastructure to converged infrastructure. And now it’s moving
us to HCI and the SDDC.
HCI powered by vSAN allows you to grow as needed and doesn’t

require organizations to immediately replace their entire IT
infrastructure. With vSAN, an organization can start as small as a
minimum of three hosts that contribute capacity to the cluster, or
two hosts in a vSAN cluster that consists of two data hosts and an
external witness host.
Break Down Traditional Data Center Silos

With a full-featured HCI environment, you can eliminate many
of the components and hardware silos found in traditional infra-
structure. In simple terms, with HCI you need a lot less stuff in
your data center. This simplicity helps you reduce operational
time and complexity across your data center.
To help simplify your environment, HCI:
»» Provides a single, integrated software stack that runs on

industry-standard servers
»» Delivers ease of deployment and maintenance, with
policy-driven automation
»» Reduces physical components to manage, monitor, and
maintain
Future-Proof Infrastructure
With a software-defined infrastructure built on industry-
standard x86 servers, organizations can future-proof their stor-
age investment and avoid vendor lock-in. New capabilities and
features are introduced in software upgrades rather than costly
“forklift” hardware replacements, and organizations can easily
scale HCI to meet changing business requirements.
Delivering Native Security

Security is a top concern for organizations. vSAN offers the first
native HCI security solution with the following capabilities and
benefits:
»» Native protection: With native encryption inside the

hypervisor, you can protect against unauthorized access
to at-rest data with a set-and-forget capability.
»» Simplified management: Simple encryption deployment
and management with a single key per cluster that works
with industry-leading Key Management Interoperability
Protocol (KMIP) compliant key manager servers.
»» Lower cost: Native, software-defined HCI encryption is
hardware-agnostic, meaning organizations can deploy
the storage hardware of their choice — no need for self-
encryption drives (SEDs) that can be up to 30 percent
more expensive than standard drives.
»» Built for compliance: vSAN’s native security extends HCI
to organizations with compliance requirements, such as
two-factor authentication (SecureID and common access
card [CAC]), and offers the first Defense Information Systems
Agency (DISA)–approved Security Technical Implementation
Guide (STIG) for HCI.
vSAN is designed for predictable, elastic, nondisruptive scaling

of compute and storage resources. You can scale out the clus-
ter linearly, one node at a time, or scale up by adding capacity
to existing hosts. vSAN eliminates the need for bulk purchases,
expensive upgrades, or forklift replacements of existing hard-
ware, and enables linear, predictable, grow-as-you-go scaling to
match workload demands.
Enable a Multi-Cloud Platform
All businesses can benefit from a multi-cloud approach to their
infrastructure. Start your multi-cloud journey easily by con-
necting your on-premises environment to the cloud with vSAN+.
Enhance IT productivity with centralized visibility and alerts for
your vSAN infrastructure from a single cloud console, and manage
virtual machine (VM)– and container-based applications seam-
lessly with VMware Tanzu integration.
When you’re ready to take advantage of more cloud services,

VMware HCI solutions have native services to all the public
cloud providers, making it easy to extend to the cloud or migrate
applications.
Maximize Options with the Largest

Hardware Ecosystem
With thousands of partners worldwide, VMware is positioned
to help customers scale their business, drive innovation, and
transform their customer experience. VMware provides industry-
leading deployment flexibility with the largest HCI ecosystem
and a wide array of deployment options. VMware partners offer
more than 500 ReadyNodes or highly customizable, jointly certi-
fied servers, as well as jointly engineered global partner appliance
solutions for a simplified approach to HCI.
WILEY END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT
Go to www.wiley.com/go/eula to access Wiley’s ebook EULA.

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Any dissemination, distribution, or unauthorized use is strictly prohibited.

LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: WHILE THE PUBLISHER AND AUTHORS HAVE

ISBN 978-1-394-17712-7 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-394-17713-4 (ebk)

Editorial Manager: Rev Mengle Production Editor:

CHAPTER 1: Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved................ 5

CHAPTER 2: Understanding Hyperconverged

CHAPTER 3: Recognizing Why You Need

CHAPTER 4: Exploring Use Cases.................................................................. 25

CHAPTER 5: Getting Started with Your Deployment................... 31

CHAPTER 6: Taking the Next Step to Multi-cloud

CHAPTER 7: Ten Reasons to Love VMware HCI

vi Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

HCI is an ideal platform for managing traditional virtual machines

HCI increases business agility with automation, reducing the need

»» Business imperatives and key trends that are shaping the

Mainly, I assume that you’re an infrastructure and operations

If any of these assumptions describes you, then this is the book

2 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

This icon points out important information you should commit to

Beyond the Book

»» Recognizing key trends

»» Simplifying storage infrastructure

Recognizing the Business Imperative

CHAPTER 1 Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved 5

Multi-cloud strategies enable organizations to take advantage of

Multi-cloud consists of two or more public and/or private clouds.

Today, cloud-native technologies — such as containers, Kubernetes,

6 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

Evolving storage landscape

Multi-cloud, cloud-native, and the need for a more agile data

»» On the upside: Modern storage arrays offer great capabili-

CHAPTER 1 Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved 7

The traditional enterprise storage model has many operational

»» Most organizations rely on purpose-built, dedicated

Clearly, traditional approaches to infrastructure fall far short of

Adapting with New Strategies

Traditional storage infrastructure

8 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

Figure 1-1 shows the traditional approach as an expensive solu-

FIGURE 1-1: Traditional silo-based infrastructure.

Applications are everywhere

CHAPTER 1 Seeing How the Data Center Has Evolved 9

These applications are increasingly being deployed and operated

A traditional, unvirtualized enterprise infrastructure typically

To be successful, enterprise IT must proactively manage an ever-

The high cost of existing solutions

Additionally, end-user expectations are increasing because of the

These expectations put more pressure on your IT team to evolve

10 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

»» Discovering how hyperconverged

»» Exploring common hyperconverged

»» Looking at the key components of a

Defining Hyperconverged Infrastructure

CHAPTER 2 Understanding Hyperconverged Infrastructure 11

HCI originally included just virtual compute and virtual storage.

In an HCI environment, compute, storage, and management

12 Hyperconverged Infrastructure For Dummies, VMware 2nd Special Edition

Understanding How Hyperconverged