{"id":13997,"date":"2013-01-08T13:20:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-08T13:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=13997"},"modified":"2013-01-08T13:20:00","modified_gmt":"2013-01-08T13:20:00","slug":"windows-server-2012-nic-teaming-part-2-whats-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=13997","title":{"rendered":"Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 2 \u2013 What\u2019s What?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Permalink to: Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 1 \u2013 Back To Basics\" rel=\"bookmark\" href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=13984\">Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 1 \u2013 Back To Basics<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Terminology<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>There is some terminology for a WS2012 NIC team.\u00a0 The below diagram depicts this terminology:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Team members<\/em> or <em>network adapters<\/em>: These are the physical NICs in your server or host that make up the NIC team.\u00a0 I tend to use the term <em>team member<\/em>.<\/li>\n<li><em>Team <\/em>or <em>NIC team<\/em>: this is the aggregation of team members to give us an LBFO team.<\/li>\n<li><em>Team Interfaces, Team NICs, <\/em>or <em>tNICs<\/em>: This are the possible terms for the connections that are created for the NIC team.\u00a0 I tend to use the term <em>team interface<\/em>.\u00a0 A team has at least one team interface, and this is where the IP stack is configured<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image9.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image_thumb8.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"244\" height=\"106\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Team Members<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A WS2012 NIC team can be comprised of up to 32 team members.\u00a0 I can\u2019t imagine ever seeing such a team in production, but you can do it.\u00a0 These team members don\u2019t have to be the same model or same manufacturer.<\/p>\n<p><em>An interesting design is to deliberately use team members from different manufacturers for failover in the same team. Some networking issues I\u2019ve seen have been related to 3rd party NIC drivers or firmware.\u00a0 If you have an Intel NIC and a Broadcom NIC in the same team, and the Broadcom NIC has an issue, then the Intel NIC can stay online and keep the virtual machines on the network \u2026 assuming the driver failure doesn\u2019t cause a BSOD <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wlEmoticon wlEmoticon-smile\" style=\"border-style: none;\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/wlEmoticon-smile3.png\" alt=\"Smile\" \/> In the era of dual and quad port NICs, this would be an expensive design, but it might be valuable for <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">true<\/span> mission critical deployments (where people might die, and not honest )<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Note that it is possible to designate a team member as a hot standby NIC in the team.\u00a0 This means that it remains offline until another NIC fails.\u00a0 I used to struggle to figure out why you would do this.\u00a0 Hans Vredeveoort (MVP) suggested one good reason to me: troubleshooting the team without breaking it.\u00a0 Convert a NIC in a 2 team member team to a hot standby.\u00a0 That forces traffic through the other team member and thus through one path in the physical network.<\/p>\n<p>Can you mix NICs of different speeds? Yes you can <strong><em><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">BUT<\/span><\/em><\/strong> to be supported, the active team members in the team must be running at the same speed.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve since come up with a second reason to use the hot standby option. Once again, you have a team with two team members.\u00a0 You want 10 GbE networking but have limited budget for switch ports.\u00a0 So you put in one 10 GbE NIC as the active NIC and one 1 GbE NIC as the hot standby.\u00a0 If the 10 GbE team member goes offline then the team remains operational, although it is now crippled because it has 10% of the bandwidth that it had before the failure.\u00a0 It\u2019s an option, even if it is a pretty horrible one.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image10.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image_thumb9.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"304\" height=\"438\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Team Interfaces<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>When you create a team, there will be one team interface.\u00a0 This is kind of a network interface that appears in Control Panel (Networking), as you can see below:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image11.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image_thumb10.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"404\" height=\"161\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The team interface has a device name of Microsoft Network Adapter Multiplexor Driver.\u00a0 This is the device that you:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Configure TCP\/IP on<\/li>\n<li>Connect a Hyper-V virtual switch to<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>A team can have many team interfaces, <strong><em><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">BUT<\/span><\/em> <\/strong>the team must have only 1 team interface if you are going to use the team to connect and external virtual switch.\u00a0 The NIC team <strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em>must<\/em><\/span><\/strong> be dedicated to the external virtual switch \u2013 no exceptions; Microsoft and the NIC team don\u2019t care what your budget or bosses demands are.<\/p>\n<p>You can create multiple team interfaces, e.g. a NIC team on a web server. The below example shows a scenario where the first team interface is in <em>default mode<\/em>.\u00a0 This is \u2026 well \u2026 the default mode of the first team interface of any NIC team.\u00a0 This interface will accept all traffic sent into a team.\u00a0 A second team interface has been created.\u00a0 Only one team interface can be in default mode.\u00a0 Every other team interface must be in VLAN mode.\u00a0 This binds a team interface to a single VLAN, so the IP stack of that team interface should be configured appropriately for that VLAN.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image12.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image_thumb11.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"304\" height=\"304\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>You can configure all team interfaces to be on a specific VLAN (i.e. in VLAN mode).\u00a0 Any traffic that is not routed to a team interface, i.e. not on a valid VLAN, is sent to a black hole (the trash).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image13.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/image_thumb12.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"404\" height=\"284\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Remember, if a NIC team is to be used to connect an external virtual switch to the LAN, then that NIC team must have a single team interface.\u00a0 And that NIC team must be in default mode.\u00a0 No exceptions.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Don\u2019t Get \u201cClever\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It is not supported to:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Try mix elements of 3rd party NIC teaming with WS2012 NIC teaming<\/li>\n<li>Make teams of teams<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Just keep it simple.\u00a0 You also need to use team members that are on the WS2012 Hardware Compatibility List (HCL), i.e. they have been successfully logo tested for Windows Server 2012.<\/p>\n<p>This information has been brought to you by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Windows-Server-Hyper-V-Installation-Configuration\/dp\/1118486498%3FSubscriptionId%3DAKIAIJ5WNI7ZSH7W4OXA%26tag%3Dafm0c-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D1118486498\" target=\"_blank\">Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Installation and Configuration Guide<\/a> (available on pre-order on Amazon) where you\u2019ll find lots of PowerShell like in this script:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Windows-Server-Hyper-V-Installation-Configuration\/dp\/1118486498%3FSubscriptionId%3DAKIAIJ5WNI7ZSH7W4OXA%26tag%3Dafm0c-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D1118486498\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"float: none; margin-left: auto; display: block; margin-right: auto;\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/image_thumb19.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"196\" height=\"244\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"class\" style=\"float: none; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding: 0px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=14004\">Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 3 \u2013 Switch Connection Modes<\/a><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=14032\">Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 4 \u2013 Load Distribution<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=14039\">Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 5 \u2013 Configuration Matrix<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"class\" style=\"float: none; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding: 0px;\">Technorati Tags: <a rel=\"tag\" href=\"http:\/\/technorati.com\/tags\/Windows+Server+2012\">Windows Server 2012<\/a>,<a rel=\"tag\" href=\"http:\/\/technorati.com\/tags\/Hyper-V\">Hyper-V<\/a>,<a rel=\"tag\" href=\"http:\/\/technorati.com\/tags\/Networking\">Networking<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 1 \u2013 Back To Basics Terminology There is some terminology for a WS2012 NIC team.\u00a0 The below diagram depicts this terminology: Team members or network adapters: These are the physical NICs in your server or host that make up the NIC team.\u00a0 I tend to use the term team &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/?p=13997\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Windows Server 2012 NIC Teaming Part 2 \u2013 What\u2019s What?&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[181,80,118],"class_list":["post-13997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hyper-v","tag-hyper-v","tag-networking","tag-windows-server-2012"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13997\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aidanfinn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}