How does Powerconvert/PortabilitySuite handle NIC teaming on source workloads

  • 7004760
  • 29-Oct-2009
  • 25-Jul-2017

Environment

PlateSpin Migrate 9 .x, 11.x. 12.x

PlateSpin Protect 10.x, 11.x
PlateSpin Forge 3.x, 4.x, 11.x

Situation

This article explains how the Products handles teamed NICs on source workloads during conversion jobs.
 
 

The products discovers all NICs that bind to TCP/IP, be it teamed or not. If all physical NICs are teamed on the source machine, then the teamed interface (also called virtual interface) is discovered as the only interface. If there are some NICs in a team and others not, then the teamed NICs will be seen as one interface and others as individual interfaces. During conversion of Windows workloads, the product removes all info pertaining to teaming during configuration of target machine. This happens by default for Linux platforms, therefore, the products doesn't have to take any action.

 

With the above as explained, there can be few different scenarios when we configure a conversion job. Here’s a breakdown of the same based on type of job and source OS platform (based on assumption that we have 2 or more NICs on source are teamed to form one virtual interface):

 

 

1. Windows based take control job is not affected by NIC teaming implementation on source workload as the source is booted into Winpe. It will allow selection of only 1 NIC to be used on source workload when it boots into Winpe. Target VM, by default, will be created with the same number of NICs as on source. The option to exclude any unwanted NICs from conversion is available during job configuration. The number of NICs created on the target VM will be equal to the number of NICs converted.

 

2. Linux based take control job will allow selection of only the first NIC (mostly Eth0) to be used on source workload when it boots with Ramdisk. Target VM, by default, will be created with the same number of NICs as on source. The option to exclude any unwanted NICs from conversion is available during job configuration. The number of NICs created on the target VM will be equal to the number of NICs converted.

 

3. Windows based Live transfer jobs will not allow selection of any NICs on source workload because only the virtual interface is available for conversion. This is due to NIC teaming being in effect as the source workload is in native OS during the conversion. Target VM will be created with a single NIC based on the fact that we only see one interface on source. 

 

4. For conversions to target physical machines, only one NIC will be converted as the target will be registered with only one NIC. This is regardless of the type of transfer method.

 

 

Note: If there are additional NICs which are not teamed but are enabled, they will be available for conversion as well.

 

 

 

 

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