I wanted to start utilizing an iSCSI storage system that we had for our ESX servers but didn’t want to have the iSCSI traffic using any of the existing NIC’s in these ESX servers. So the first step was to put the NIC’s we previously added to the servers into a new VSwitch. Connection type for ISCSI will use vkernel.
Once the VSwitch is created take note of use the name assigned. In this case vmk3
The default software iSCSI adapter listed under configuration -> storage adapters on the ESX host show up on my system as vmhba37.
To view which NIC’s, if any, have been assigned to the iSCSI software adapter (vmhba37)you can run the following command:
[acct@esxserver ~]# esxcli swiscsi nic list -d vmhba37 Errors: No nics found for this adapter.
In this instance there are no NIC’s assigned to vmhba37. Since none are specified, by default the system will pick an existing one at random and use it.
To assign specific NIC(s) to the iSCSI software adapter you can run the following command(s).
[acct@esxserver ~]#esxcli swiscsi nic add -n vmk3 -d vmhba37
[acct@esxserver ~]#esxcli swiscsi nic list -d vmhba37 vmk3 pNic name: vmnic5 ipv4 address: 10.10.10.42 ipv4 net mask: 255.255.255.0 ipv6 addresses: mac address: g4:de:56:a4:3c:42 mtu: 1500 toe: false tso: true tcp checksum: false vlan: true vlanId: 0 ports reserved: 63488~65536 link connected: true ethernet speed: 1000 packets received: 5270264 packets sent: 26 NIC driver: igb driver version: 3.1.17 firmware version: 3.19-0
You can see by running the “list” command that after you’ve assigned the NIC to the iSCSI software adapter it now shows additional info, specifically network info for the assigned NIC.