HP Virtual Connect Flex-10 10Gb Ethernet Module for c-Class BladeSystem - Manual (Page 173)

Configuring the Virtual Connect domain using the CLI 173
Network setup
To establish external Ethernet network connectivity for the HP BladeSystem c-Class enclosure:
1. Identify the MAC addresses to be used on the server blades deployed within this Virtual Connect
domain.
2. Set up connections from the HP BladeSystem c-Class enclosure to the external Ethernet networks.
These connections can be uplinks dedicated to a specific Ethernet network or shared uplinks that carry
multiple Ethernet networks with the use of VLAN tags.
Configuring MAC address ranges
To configure MAC address ranges, use the set domain command.
To use VC-defined MAC addresses:
>set domain MacType=VC-Defined MacPool=10
To use factory-default MAC addresses:
>set domain MacType=Factory-Default
To set user-defined MAC addresses:
>set domain MacType=User-Defined MacStart=00-17-A4-77-00-00
MacEnd=00-17-A4-77-00-FF
IMPORTANT: Configuring Virtual Connect to assign server blade MAC addresses requires
careful planning to ensure that the configured range of MAC addresses is used once within the
environment. Duplicate MAC addresses on an Ethernet network can result in a server network
outage.
Each server blade Ethernet NIC ships with a factory default MAC address. The MAC address is a 48-bit
number that uniquely identifies the Ethernet interface to other devices on the network. While the hardware
ships with default MAC addresses, Virtual Connect can assign MAC addresses that override the factory
default MAC addresses while the server remains in that Virtual Connect enclosure.
Always establish control processes to ensure that a unique MAC address range is used in each Virtual
Connect domain in the environment. Reusing address ranges could result in server network outages caused
by multiple servers having the same MAC addresses.
If using Virtual Connect assigned MAC addresses, the following notes apply:
• Virtual Connect automatically assigns two MAC addresses to each VC-Enet connection in the server
profile, a primary address for the Ethernet NIC, and an iSCSI MAC address for use by multifunction
gigabit server adapters, such as the HP NC373m PCI Express Dual Port Multifunction Gigabit Server
Adapter. Only the primary MAC address is used by standard (not multifunction) Ethernet devices.
• If a server blade is moved from a Virtual Connect managed enclosure to a non-Virtual Connect
enclosure, the local MAC addresses on that server blade are automatically returned to the original
factory defaults.
• If a server blade is removed from a bay within a Virtual Connect domain and installed in another bay
in the same Virtual Connect domain or in a bay in a different domain, it is assigned the new set of
addresses appropriate for that server location.
• When FlexFabric adapters are in use, Virtual Connect assigns a MAC address to each FCoE connection
in the server profile.