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Design considerations for Azure VMware Solution Generation 2 Private Clouds (preview)

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This article outlines key design considerations for Azure VMware Solution Generation 2 (Gen 2) private clouds. It explains the capabilities this generation brings to VMware-based private cloud environments, enabling access for your applications from both on-premises infrastructure and Azure-based resources. There are several considerations to review before you set up your Azure VMware Solution Gen 2 private cloud. This article provides solutions for use cases that you might encounter when you're using the private cloud type.

Note

This is currently a Public Preview offering. For more information, see our Supplemental Terms of Use for Microsoft Azure Previews.

Limitations during Public Preview

The following functionality is limited during this time. These limitations will be lifted in the future:

  • You cannot delete your Resource Group, which contains your private cloud.
  • You can only deploy 1 private cloud per Azure Virtual Network.
  • You can only create 1 private cloud per Resource Group. Multiple private clouds in a single Resource Group are not supported.
  • Your private cloud and Virtual Network for your private cloud must be in the same Resource Group.
  • You cannot move your private cloud from one Resource Group to another after the private cloud is created.
  • Virtual Network Service Endpoints direct connectivity from Azure VMware Solution workloads is not supported.
  • vCloud Director using Private Endpoints is supported. However, vCloud Director using Public Endpoints is not supported.
  • vSAN Stretched Clusters is not supported.
  • Public IP down to the VMware NSX Microsoft Edge for configuring internet will not be supported.
  • Support for AzCLI, PowerShell, and .NET SDK are not available during Public Preview.
  • Run commands interacting with customer segments aren't supported, including Zerto, JetStream, and other 3rd-party integrations.

Unsupported integrations during Public Preview

The following 1st-party and 3rd-party integrations won't be available during Public Preview:

  • Azure Elastic SAN
  • Zerto DR
  • JetStream DR

Routing and subnet considerations

Azure VMware Solution Gen 2 private clouds provide a VMware private cloud environment accessible to users and applications from on-premises and Azure-based environments or resources. Connectivity is delivered through standard Azure Networking. Specific network address ranges and firewall ports are required to enable these services. This section helps you configure your networking to work with Azure VMware Solution.

The private cloud connects to your Azure virtual network using standard Azure networking. Azure VMware Solution Gen 2 private clouds require a minimum /22 CIDR network address block for subnets. This network complements your on-premises networks, so the address block shouldn't overlap with address blocks used in other virtual networks in your subscription and on-premises networks. Management, vMotion, and Replication networks are provisioned automatically within this address block as subnets inside your Virtual Network.

Note

Permitted ranges for your address block are the RFC 1918 private address spaces (10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12, 192.168.0.0/16), except for 172.17.0.0/16. Replication network is not applicable to AV64 nodes and is planned for general deprecation at a future date.

Avoid using the following IP schema reserved for VMware NSX usage:

  • 169.254.0.0/24 - used for internal transit network
  • 169.254.2.0/23 - used for inter-VRF transit network
  • 100.64.0.0/16 - used to connect T1 and T0 gateways internally
  • 100.73.x.x – used by Microsoft’s management network

Example /22 CIDR network address block 10.31.0.0/22 is divided into the following subnets:

Network Usage Subnet Description Example
VMware NSX Network /27 NSX Manager network. 10.31.0.0/27
vCSA Network /27 vCenter Server network. 10.31.0.32/27
esx-cust-fdc /27 The management appliances (vCenter Server and NSX manager) are behind the "esx-cust-fdc” subnet, programmed as secondary IP ranges on this subnet. 10.31.0.64/27
cust-fds /27 Used by Azure VMware Solution Gen 2 to program routes created in VMware NSX into the virtual network. 10.31.0.96/27
services /27 Used for Azure VMware Solution Gen 2 provider services. Also used to configure private DNS resolution for your private cloud. 10.31.0.160/27
esx-lrnsxuplink, esx-lrnsxuplink-1 /28 Subnets off each of the T0 Gateways per edge. These subnets are used to program VMware NSX network segments as secondary IPs addresses. 10.31.0.224/28, 10.31.0.240/28
esx-cust-vmk1 /24 vmk1 is the management interface used by customers to access the host. IPs from the vmk1 interface come from these subnets. All of the vmk1 traffic for all hosts comes from this subnet range. 10.31.1.0/24
esx-vmotion-vmk2 /24 vMotion VMkernel interfaces. 10.31.2.0/24
esx-vsan-vmk3 /24 vSAN VMkernel interfaces and node communication. 10.31.3.0/24
Reserved /27 Reserved Space. 10.31.0.128/27
Reserved /27 Reserved Space. 10.31.0.192/27

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