This page describes the steps to use a StorSimple 8000 series iSCSI SAN for vSphere.

Steps:

• Configure iSCSI software adapter on vSphere hosts
• Create iSCSI LUNs on Storsimple and allow vSphere hosts access
• Attach iSCSI LUN to vSphere hosts and create VMFS datastore
• Place VM on iSCSI datastore

Procedure

• Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
• Click the Manage tab, and click Storage.
• Click Storage Adapters, and click Add.
• Select Software iSCSI Adapter and confirm that you want to add the adapter.
  • Note that the vSphere Web Client automatically opens the required ports in the firewall.

After a refresh the software iSCSI adapter is visible as vmhba34 and can be modified. Note the identifier name (iqn) as you’ll need it later on.

• IQN: iqn.1998-01.com.vmware:<hostname>-<random id>

Procedure

• Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
• Click Actions > Add Networking.
• Select VMkernel Network Adapter, and click Next.
• Select an existing standard switch: vSwitch0
• Enter a network label: iSCSI-vmnic2 / iSCSI-vmnic4
  • and a VLAN ID: 800
• Specify the IP settings
• Review the information and click Finish.

Repeat this because we need more than one active iSCSI NIC

Procedure

• Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
• Click the Manage tab, and click Networking.
• Click Virtual Switches, and select the vSphere switch that you want to modify from the list.
• On the vSwitch diagram, select the VMkernel adapter and click the Edit Settings icon.

• On the Edit Settings wizard, click Teaming and Failover and click Override under Failover Order.
• Designate only one physical adapter as active and move all remaining adapters to the Unused Adapters category.

> Repeat for both vmkernel ports

Note that if the VMKernel port has more than one active adapter or an adapter in the standby adapater list it won’t show up as an available VMkernel Port for binding with the iSCSI adapter.

Procedure

• Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
• Click the Manage tab, and click Storage.
• Click Storage Adapters and select the software adapter to configure from the list.
• Under Adapter Details, click the Network Port Binding tab and click Add.
• Select both VMkernel adapters to bind with the iSCSI adapter.
• Click OK.

• Log in on azure (https://manage.windowsazure.com/)
• Go to storsmple → select the correct StorSimple Manager Service
• Next click on the devices tab and click on the name of the device you want to create a volume on
• Click on the Volume Containers Tab and click on the name of the Volume Container you want to create the volume in. While working inside the Volume container click on the ‘+’ sign in the bottom of the screen to add a volume.
• In the Add a Volume wizard provide a unique name and provisioned capacity of the volume.
  • Name: SSVol001_ACP
  • Usage Type: Tiered Volume
  • Fill in ACR which contains the name of a server and the iSCSI iniator name (iqn). To attach the volume to a server not yet in the drop down list, type the server name and iqn in the text boxes under Add new ACR.
  • Uncheck the box for enabling a default backup for this volume, which would set a daily backup at 22:30. We’ll assign a backup policy later on.
• Finished

> NOTE: It is not possible to influence the LUNID on the StorSimple we can not the LUN ID in the name so we simply number them. To make sure you can make a relation between the StorSimple Volume, the vSphere device and the vSphere datastore always name all three the same. To rename the vSphere Device, see below.

• Browse to the host in the vSphere Web Client navigator.
• Click the Manage tab, and click Storage.
• Click Storage Adapters and select the iSCSI adapter to configure from the list.
• Under Adapter Details, click the Targets tab.
• Configure the discovery method.
  • Click Dynamic Discovery and click Add.
  • Enter the target’s information and click OK
  • Optional: also add second ip address of storsimple
    • Note that the Storsimple will send both target addresses when rescanning the adapter. Check that 4 paths are available per device after scanning.
• Rescan the iSCSI adapter.

To rename the vSphere Device, go to the storage adapter, go to devices for the specific iSCSI Software adapter, select the device and click to update the LUN Display Name:

• Rightclick host
• Select storage → create datastore
• Follow the wizard and make sure to enter the same name as the volume has in the StorSimple.

Use a storage vMotion to move the VM

Go to Device page for which you created the Volume, click on the Backup Policies tab. Click on the name of the backup policy you want to add the volume to. On the bottom of the page, in the Volumes section add the new volume by using the drop down list.

https://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-60/topic/com.vmware.ICbase/PDF/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-60-storage-guide.pdf
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/services/storsimple/