Cisco Intersight Virtual Appliance is available in multiple deployment sizes to support the scaling requirements of your environment. You can deploy the Appliance as follows:

New Deployments—You can deploy Intersight Virtual Appliance in medium or large configurations. Before selecting the size, assess your resource requirements and choose an appropriate option in the Intersight Appliance Maintenance Shell, and then select the required size to deploy. The selected size will be deployed when the appliance VM restarts. For information about resource requirements, see Resource Requirements for Intersight Virtual Appliance.

The following table lists the supported configuration limits:

The Cisco Intersight Virtual Appliance can be deployed on VMware ESXi 7.0 or later, Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2016, 2019, and 2022, KVM hypervisor on Linux, and Nutanix AHV hypervisor (minimum supported version is 6.5.4 LTS). You can deploy Intersight Virtual Appliance in a medium or large configurations.

For more information on the supported maximum configuration limits for Intersight Virtual Appliance Sizing Options, see Supported Configuration Limits for Intersight Virtual Appliance.

Attention

*Cisco recommends that you use thick provisioning. While it is possible to use thin provisioning, over-provisioning can lead to a lack of storage capacity which can then result in degradation and loss of service, and might require a restore from backup. It is highly recommended to place appliance disks on a volume backed by SSDs. Do not change the default settings for disk sizes while installing Intersight Virtual Appliance on VMware vSphere. The disk sizes are computed based on the deployment configuration. It is mandatory to have a CPU that supports the AVX feature. If you have the Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) level configured for your VMware vSphere cluster, ensure that the EVC level is set to a CPU family that supports the AVX feature. If the allocated resources fall below the default values required for a medium deployment (24 for vCPU and 64 GiB for RAM), then Assist will be the only option available for deployment. Other options will be grayed out. Small configuration is still supported on existing deployments. For more information, see VM Resource Requirements for Existing Intersight Virtual Appliance Deployments. Metric collection: In a single-node deployment, metrics data collection is supported for the essential tier license and is an opt-in feature. For information on how to configure metrics collection, see Configuring Metrics Collection. In a multi-node deployment, you can add a metrics node to a standalone appliance (two-node setup) or to a HA management cluster (four-node setup) that allows for advantage tier metrics data collection. For information about configuring a metrics node, see Configuring a Multi-Node Cluster for Increased Metrics Scalability in Intersight Virtual Appliance. When the active server count for which metrics is collected exceeds the threshold that your appliance size can support, be it medium or large, Intersight Virtual Appliance automatically disables metrics collection. This precaution is taken to prevent any negative impacts on performance, allowing for smooth system operation without the need for manual intervention. Once the metrics collection is disabled, you will have to enable it manually, after the resource requirements are met for this feature. In a multi-node deployment (two-node and four-node), when the storage capacity of disk8 on the metrics node reaches 90%, metrics data collection is automatically disabled. At this point, you must manually increase the storage capacity of disk8 on the metrics node and then proceed to re-enable the metrics data collection. For more information on managing resources, see Managing Resources for Intersight Virtual Appliance. Any metrics that have been collected while the metrics collection was enabled will remain accessible, even if metrics collection is later paused. This ensures the continued availability of historical datasets for future analysis and reference. Enforcement of the storage and retention policies for metrics continues, even when the metrics collection is disabled. For more information about metrics collection, see Monitoring Overview. Additional Networking Requirements for Multi-node Deployments: Disk write speed must be greater than 150 megabytes per second. Latency between nodes must be less than 9 milliseconds. All three hostnames for the nodes must be resolved by the same set of DNS servers.

Intersight evaluates the changes that are required in the CPU, RAM, and disk to determine the deployment size during the reboot after an update from the cloud service. As a result of the evaluation, one of the following outcomes occurs:

• If the minimum required resources for a particular deployment size are not available, the Intersight services are shut down and the appliance remains powered on. However, the appliance may not be functional and the services running could be unstable. Intersight Appliance Maintenance Shell displays an error message regarding the resource status during the reboot. Log into the Maintenance Shell to learn more about the error and the required remedial actions.

• If the deployment size is the same as the existing deployment, the VM restarts without any change. You can upgrade to a higher deployment size after determining resource requirements.

Attention

*Cisco recommends that you use thick provisioning. While it is possible to use thin provisioning, over-provisioning can lead to a lack of storage capacity which can then result in degradation and loss of service, and might require a restore from backup. It is mandatory to have a CPU that supports the AVX feature. If you have the Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) level configured for your VMware vSphere cluster, ensure that the EVC level is set to a CPU family that supports the AVX feature. It is highly recommended to place appliance disks on a volume backed by SSDs.

Managing Resources for Intersight Virtual Appliance Deployments

You can view the deployment size of Intersight Virtual Appliance and make changes to CPU, RAM, and disk size as follows:

1. Choose System > Appliance Details.

2. Review the other supported scaling options and choose the appropriate deployment size to suit your requirements.

3. After you review the details of the resource requirement for a supported deployment option, shut down the VM, change the CPU, RAM, and disk size as required, and restart the VM.

Note	You cannot change the disk sizes when you have a snapshot. To ensure optimal performance of the virtual sizing options, make sure your appliance is running the latest software version.

The following table provides information about the disk size requirements for Intersight Virtual Appliance installations.

Note	Alternatively, you can meet the disk requirements by performing a restore using the latest backup of the appliance. For more information, see Recovering Intersight Connected Virtual Appliance and Recovering Intersight Connected Virtual Appliance.

IP Address and Hostname Requirements for Intersight Virtual Appliance

Setting up a single-node Intersight Virtual Appliance requires an IPv4 address and 2 DNS records for that IP address. The DNS records must be in the following formats:

• mymanagementhost.mydomain.com—A DNS record in this format is used to access the GUI. This must be defined as an A record and associated PTR record in DNS. The PTR record is required for reverse lookup of the IP address. If an IP address resolves to multiple hostnames, the first resolved hostname is used. Do not include the dc- prefix in this hostname.

• dc-mymanagementhost.mydomain.com—The dc- must be prepended to your hostname. This DNS record must be defined as the CNAME of mymanagementhost.mydomain.com. DNS records in this format are used internally by the appliance to manage target connections.

Setting up a multi-node for advantage tier metrics data collection in Intersight Virtual Appliance (two-node cluster) requires an IPv4 address and 2 DNS records for that IP address for the single-node (appliance management node) and requires an IPv4 address and one DNS record for that IP address for the metrics node. The DNS records must be in the following format:

• mymanagementhost.mydomain.com

• mymetricshost.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost.mydomain.com

Setting up a multi-node cluster for high availability in Intersight Virtual Appliance (three-node cluster) requires three hostnames, three IP addresses, and one DC-CNAME for each hostname. The following is an example of the formats:

• mymanagementhost1.mydomain.com

• mymanagementhost2.mydomain.com

• mymanagementhost3.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost1.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost2.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost3.mydomain.com

Setting up a multi-node for metrics data collection in Intersight Virtual Appliance (four-node cluster) requires three hostnames, three IP addresses, and one DC-CNAME for each hostname for the HA management cluster. It also requires an IPv4 address and one DNS record for that IP address for the metrics node. The following is an example of the formats:

• mymanagementhost1.mydomain.com

• mymanagementhost2.mydomain.com

• mymanagementhost3.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost1.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost2.mydomain.com

• dc-mymanagementhost3.mydomain.com

• mymetricshost.mydomain.com

Attention

Ensure that the appropriate entries of type A, CNAME, and PTR records exist in the DNS, as described above.

Intersight Virtual Appliance reserves the following IP address ranges for internal communication:

• /20 subnet within the 172.16.0.0/12 range—This subnet is one-time configurable during the appliance installation.

• 192.168.20.21/32—This IP address is reserved by the appliance and is non-configurable.

Port Requirements for Intersight Virtual Appliance

The following table lists the ports that are required for Intersight Virtual Appliance communication.

Note	The information in this section is applicable only for Intersight Connected Virtual Appliance deployments.

• Ensure that Cisco Intersight Virtual Appliance has access to the following sites directly or through a proxy. For more information about setting up a proxy, see Cloud Connection for Intersight Connected Virtual Appliance. All the following URLs are accessed through HTTPS.

  • Access to Cisco services (*.cisco.com).

    Cisco Service	Description	Target Device
    smartreceiver.cisco.com:443	For access to Cisco Smart Licensing Manager
    swapi.cisco.com:443	For access to Cisco Smart Licensing Manager
    tools.cisco.com:443	For access to Cisco Smart Licensing Manager
    download-ssc.cisco.com*, dl.cisco.com, dl1.cisco.com, dl2.cisco.com	For access to Cisco Software download site	Required for the following: C-Series Standalone Servers UCSM Managed B-Series and C-Series servers UCSM Managed Fabric Interconnects UCSM Managed Fabric Interconnects-attached Cisco UCS S3260 Chassis
    api.cisco.com:443
    cloudsso.cisco.com:443

    ^* Cisco Intersight allows you to manage firmware downloads through a new domain download-ssc.cisco.com. Make sure that you add this new domain to the firewall and network rules. For more information, see Cisco Software Download.

  • The Cisco services (*.cisco.com) that Intersight can access (either directly or through a proxy) to gain additional benefits are as follows:

    Cisco Service	Description	Target Device
    cdn.intersight.com, cdn.eu-central-1.intersight.com	For faster download of firmware image	Required for the following: C-Series Standalone servers UCSM Managed B-Series and C-Series servers UCSM Managed Fabric Interconnects UCSM Managed Fabric Interconnects-attached Cisco UCS S3260 Chassis Fabric Interconnects and FI-attached servers in Intersight Managed Mode.

  • Access to Intersight Cloud services.

    Intersight Virtual Appliance connects to Intersight by resolving one of the following URLs:

    Note	IP addresses for service entry points are static. If you need specify firewall configurations for URLs with fixed IP addresses, the following are the static IP addresses corresponding to each region.

    North America (us-east-1) region

    • svc.intersight.com (Preferred).

    • svc.us-east-1.intersight.com

      Both of these URLs resolve to the following IPv4 and IPv6 addresses:

      • 52.223.48.112

      • 99.83.178.202

      • 2600:9000:a60c:6a4d:2d28:e9be:e3e:f0cf

      • 2600:9000:a706:c634:41:731c:ad1e:bf00

    EMEA (eu-central–1) region

    • svc.eu-central-1.intersight.com

    • This URL resolves to the following IPv4 and IPv6 addresses:

      • 52.223.57.109

      • 99.83.140.236

      • 2600:9000:a60c:6a4d:9a17:558a:9cc5:9196

      • 2600:9000:a706:c634:ad62:5cbb:ea7e:3dc6

• The following service entry points will be deprecated in the future:

  • svc-static1.intersight.com

  • svc-static1.eu-central-1.intersight.com

  • svc-static1.us-east-1.intersight.com

  • svc.ucs-connect.com

To claim a target, access to the North American (us-east-1) endpoints is required. If the target is claimed by a EMEA account, access to the EMEA (eu-central–1) URLs is also required.

• North American accounts: North American accounts require access to all North American endpoints before and after claiming targets.

• EMEA accounts: Targets for EMEA accounts require access to the North American endpoints so they can be claimed. After the target is claimed, only access to the EMEA endpoints is required.

For a successful target connection to Intersight Virtual Appliance, ensure that the following connectivity requirements are met:

• Ensure that a network connection can be established from the Device Connector to the appliance.

• The Device Connector establishes an HTTPS connection to <https://dc-fqdn-of-your-appliance> and then upgrades the HTTPS connection to a web socket. Ensure that your security rules allow the device connector to establish a web socket connection.

• Ensure that Intersight Management is enabled in the device connector (it is enabled by default). You can find Intersight Management in Admin > Device Connector > Intersight Management in Cisco UCS Manager/Cisco UCS Director/Cisco IMC, and Settings > Networking > Cloud Connection in the Cisco HyperFlex UI.

• If any hop between CIMC and the Appliance requires an MTU of less than 1500 bytes, ensure that the CIMC settings for ICMP Destination Unreachable Enabled and Redirect Enabled are enabled.

• Ensure that CIMC XML API is enabled.

• Check if a firewall is introduced between the managed target and the appliance, or if the rules for an existing firewall have changed, thus affecting connectivity. If the rules are changed, ensure that the changed rules permit traffic through the firewall.

• Ensure that all applicable physical and Virtual IPs are allowed through the firewall.

• If you use an HTTP proxy to route traffic out of your premises, and if you have made changes to the HTTP proxy server configuration, ensure that you change the device connector configuration accordingly. This is required because the appliance does not automatically detect HTTP proxy servers.

• Configure DNS and resolve the DNS name. The Device Connector must be able to send DNS requests to a DNS server and resolve DNS records. The Device Connector must be able to resolve dc-<fqdn-of-your-appliance> to an IP address.

• Configure NTP and validate that the target time is properly synchronized with a time server.

  Note	When the target time is not properly synchronized, the Device Connector may be unable to establish a secure connection to the appliance, and the TLS certificate may be considered invalid.

  Attention

  You must configure DNS and NTP on the management interface (Cisco UCS Manager/Cisco IMC/Cisco HyperFlex) and not on the Device Connector UI.

• You must configure security targets that are in the network path by enabling network connectivity to the appliance.

For more information on licensing, see Intersight Licensing.