New Training: vSphere Network I/O Control

In this 9-video skill, CBT Nuggets trainer Keith Barker introduces, describes, and demonstrates the use of Network I/O control in vSphere. Watch this new VMware training.

Watch the full course: VMware Certified Professional

This training includes:

• 9 videos

• 46 minutes of training

You’ll learn these topics in this skill:

• Intro to vSphere Network I/O Control

• Network I/O Control Overview

• Enabling Network I/O Control

• Network Reservations for a VM

• Network Resource Pools

• Moving VM to a new Port Group

• Bottlenecks

• Hands on Lab: NIOC

• Lab Walkthrough: NIOC

What is Network I/O Control in vSphere?

Virtual machine hosts have many jobs. One of those jobs is dividing physical resources among multiple virtual machines. That's the point of implementing a virtualized environment – using as many physical computational resources as possible without spending extra money. So, it's not uncommon for virtual machines to share the same network interface card on a physical computer.

vSphere has a few ways of doing this. One of the ways that vSphere shares a single network card with multiple virtual machines is through something called a distributed switch. A distributed switch is like a virtualized physical switch but is meant for the virtual machines hosted on the computer. Much like physical switches, these virtual distributed switches can also implement things like QoS (quality of service). Before QoS services can be configured in a distributed switch, though, network I/) controls need to be enabled first. Network I/O controls are a set of mechanisms that let distributed switches shape and form network traffic flowing through them.