VMware Distributed Power Management

 

 

 

How to Configure IPM/iLO as the VMware DPM Wake Protocol
The following steps will show you how to configure IPM/iLO as the wake protocol for VMware Distributed Power Management.

  1. GO to Home Inventory > Hosts and Clusters and select your ESXi host in the inventory.
  2. Click the Configuration tab.
  3. In the Software panel, click Power Management.
  4. Click Properties in upper-right corner.
  5. Do the following when the Edit IPM/iLO Settings dialog box appears:
    1. Enter user name.(Intelligent Platform Management Interface/Integrated Lights-Out (IPMI/iLo)
    2. Enter user password. (IPMI/iLO user password)
    3. Enter IP address. (Baseboard management controller (BMC) IP address of the lower-numbered ESXi host)
    4. Enter BMC MAC address. (BMC MAC address of the lower-numbered ESXi host)
    5. Enter BMC IP address. (BMC IP address of higher-numbered ESXi host)
    6. Enter BMC MAC address. (BMC MAC address of the higher-numbered ESXi host)

 

 

 

 

How Configure VMware DPM
The following steps will show you how to configure the cluster for VMware DPM.

  1. Right-click Lab Cluster in the inventory and select Edit Settings. The Lab Cluster Settings dialog box appears.
  2. Select the Turn on VMware HA check box.
  3. In left pane, select VMware HA.
  4. Click Percentage of cluster resources reserved as failover spare capacity and type 50.
  5. Do not click OK.
  6. In the left pane, select VMware DRS and click Fully Automated.
  7. In left pane, select Power Management.
  8. Click Automatic.
  9. Set DPM Threshold to Aggressive by moving the slider bar all the way to the right.
  10. Click OK.
  11. Read the warning in the Confirm Enable Power Management window and click OK.
  12. Monitor the Recent Tasks pane. The cluster will configure the ESXi hosts for VMware High Availability before processing VMware DPM requests.

 

 

 

How to Test VMware DPM
The following steps will show you how to test the cluster for VMware DPM by migrating the virtual machines running on the higher-numbered ESXi host to the lower-numbered ESXi host and then powering off the virtual machines on the lower-numbered ESXi host.

  1. Migrate the <name> virtual machines running on the higher-numbered ESXi host to the lower-numbered ESXi host:
    1. Select the higher-numbered ESXi host in the inventory and click the Virtual Machines tab.
    2. Right-click each virtual machine you want and select Migrate.
    3. Do the following when the Migrate Virtual Machine wizard appears:
      1. Select Change host. (Select Migration Type)
      2. Expand inventory view and select the lower-numbered ESXi host. Migration requirements are validated. If validation does not succeed, you will receive warning or error messages and will be unable to continue with the migration until the errors are resolved. (Select Destination)
      3. Keep the default. (vMotion Priority)
      4. Click Finish. (Ready to Complete)
  2. If there are virtual machines that are still powered on on the higher-numbered ESXi host, shut down these virtual machines.
  3. Select the lower-numbered ESXi host in the inventory.
  4. Click the Virtual Machines tab. Shut down all virtual machines on this host.
  5. After the last virtual machine is shut down, verify that the host automatically tries to enter standby mode. It will take several minutes for the ESXi host to enter standby mode. After the lower-numbered ESXi host has entered standby mode, notice that the virtual machines have been migrated back to the higher-numbered ESXi host. In general, if sufficient excess capacity is found, VMware DPM places one or more hosts in standby mode after migrating their virtual machines to other hosts.

 

 

 

How to Bring an ESXi Host Out of Standby Mode
The following steps will show you how to bring an ESXi host in your cluster out for standby mode.

  1. Select the higher-numbered ESXi host in the inventory and click the Virtual Machines tab.
  2. Power on one of the <name> virtual machines that you powered off previously.