VMware VLAN Tagging
There are three methods for configuring VLAN tagging:
EST - External Switch VLAN Tagging
In this method, the physical switch will have a 1:1 relationship with the vlan/portgroup. Or in other words, for every portgroup there should be a physical NIC. ESXi or vSwitch will be unaware of the tagging operation. Since the ports connected to ESXi just need to handle one vlan, the port will be configured as access port. All the portgroups connected to the virtual switch must have their VLAN ID set to 0.
And what would be the downfall of this method ?
Yes, you guessed it right!!! A seperate physical NIC for each portgroup thereby making it difficult to implement in an environment with too many portgroups/vlans. And this makes the method the least popular of the three.
And the good part about this method is its ease of implementation. No workload on ESXi and its vSwitch as the physical NIC takes care of the VLAN tagging.
VST - Virtual Switch VLAN Tagging
In this method, the vSwitch will do the tagging. Each frames going out of the vSwitch will be tagged and sent to the physical NIC. Since muliple VLAN frames pass through this NIC, the switch port connected to this should be 'trunk' ports. The advantage of this method is that a single NIC will be enough to carry out the complete traffic. And the downfall will be the additional workload of the vSwitch.
VGT - Virtual Guest VLAN Tagging
In this method, the VMs will take care of the tagging process and the vSwitch just needs to forward the tagged frames to the physical NIC. Since the physical NIC need to handle multiple VLANs, the switch port connected to the physical NIC should be in trunk mode.You must install an 802.1Q VLAN trunking driver inside the virtual machine for VGT to work.
But wait....how will the portgroup manage frames with multiple VLAN ID ?..
Create a new portgroup with VLAN ID 4095 for this purpose. This portgroup has the capability to work with multiple VLANs.
EST - External Switch VLAN Tagging
In this method, the physical switch will have a 1:1 relationship with the vlan/portgroup. Or in other words, for every portgroup there should be a physical NIC. ESXi or vSwitch will be unaware of the tagging operation. Since the ports connected to ESXi just need to handle one vlan, the port will be configured as access port. All the portgroups connected to the virtual switch must have their VLAN ID set to 0.
And what would be the downfall of this method ?
Yes, you guessed it right!!! A seperate physical NIC for each portgroup thereby making it difficult to implement in an environment with too many portgroups/vlans. And this makes the method the least popular of the three.
And the good part about this method is its ease of implementation. No workload on ESXi and its vSwitch as the physical NIC takes care of the VLAN tagging.
VST - Virtual Switch VLAN Tagging
In this method, the vSwitch will do the tagging. Each frames going out of the vSwitch will be tagged and sent to the physical NIC. Since muliple VLAN frames pass through this NIC, the switch port connected to this should be 'trunk' ports. The advantage of this method is that a single NIC will be enough to carry out the complete traffic. And the downfall will be the additional workload of the vSwitch.
VGT - Virtual Guest VLAN Tagging
In this method, the VMs will take care of the tagging process and the vSwitch just needs to forward the tagged frames to the physical NIC. Since the physical NIC need to handle multiple VLANs, the switch port connected to the physical NIC should be in trunk mode.You must install an 802.1Q VLAN trunking driver inside the virtual machine for VGT to work.
But wait....how will the portgroup manage frames with multiple VLAN ID ?..
Create a new portgroup with VLAN ID 4095 for this purpose. This portgroup has the capability to work with multiple VLANs.
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