Dell VxRail Architecture Overview

VxRail dynamic node clusters

Dynamic clusters are compute-only VxRail nodes that come with VMware ESXi. Dynamic clusters do not include a VMware vSAN license. Dynamic clusters use external storage as the primary storage to host VxRail Manager and support VM workloads. You can use a VxRail cluster VMware vSAN data store using VMware vSAN Cross-Cluster Capacity Sharing or a supported Dell storage array. You can access the external storage array over Ethernet or FC.

VxRail clusters and dynamic node clusters have the same LCM experience since they both run on HCI software. Dynamic nodes require a minimum of two nodes with the same model number. The same model number may have different memory and CPUs, but the first two nodes must be identical. Several storage protocols are supported.

BOSS drives are the only storage drives on a dynamic cluster that are used to store and boot the VMware ESXi operating system. Dynamic clusters require a supported and compatible external storage resource. The external storage resource must have sufficient storage capacity, performance, and availability characteristics to meet use case requirements. The standard cluster relies on VMware vSAN for primary storage but can also use external storage resources as secondary storage.

Like standard clusters using VMware vSAN as primary storage, the dynamic cluster works for most use cases and can support most VM workloads. Physical resources such as compute, memory, and networking are common between a standard cluster and a dynamic cluster. The features that are built into the external storage infrastructure and external storage platform determine the options for addressing requirements such as capacity and availability.