VMware and the software-defined data center (SDDC) have helped a generation of businesses grow and expand through virtualization. But now, VMware users face a major challenge in growing legacy systems beyond the data center. AWS recently launched Amazon Elastic VMware Service (Amazon EVS) to help meet this need and support the path to modernization.
Amazon EVS extends the virtualization layer seamlessly between on-premises data centers and Amazon Web Services (AWS), giving VMware administrators a way to relocate and scale their environments without having to replatform or rewrite applications.
This post will explore how the NetApp® Workload Factory Amazon EVS migration advisor simplifies transitions from on-premises VMware deployments to Amazon EVS using Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP (FSx for ONTAP) as external storage, guiding you step by step to create a well-architected storage configuration.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
- The need for more streamlined VMware migrations
- Workload Factory expedites the VMware workload relocation process to Amazon EVS
- Planning VMware workload relocations to Amazon EVS with the migration advisor
- Amazon EVS environment requirements
- Review the migration plan
- Provisioning FSx for ONTAP and Amazon EVS datastores
- Workload Factory is empowering seamless VMware workload relocations to Amazon EVS
The need for more streamlined VMware migrations
Migrating VMware workloads requires careful navigation. Organizations typically encounter several key considerations:
- Planning: Planning is a critical piece of your migration. This includes a full assessment of your existing infrastructure and understanding which workloads to run in the cloud.
- Identifying the right target: Another consideration is finding the most suitable target environment. That means evaluating multiple options in order to find the solution that will keep any migration in line with your business goals.
- Costs: Cost optimization represents a significant opportunity during cloud migrations. By leveraging rightsizing and strategic resource allocation, migrations can turn into a strategic financial optimization initiative.
- Time: Many organizations are under significant pressure to rapidly migrate their VMware environments, which can create challenges when applications require extensive refactoring or rebuilding. By embracing fast paths to AWS, teams can accelerate their cloud transition timelines, reduce operational overhead, and quickly unlock the agility and scalability of cloud environments without extensive application refactoring.
One way that customers can solve these challenges is by using Amazon EVS with FSx for ONTAP as external storage. Let’s see how Workload Factory is streamlining that solution.
Workload Factory expedites the VMware workload relocation process to Amazon EVS
Workload Factory is a specialized service that streamlines provisioning and optimizing FSx for ONTAP by combining design recommendations and best practices from AWS, VMware, and NetApp ONTAP®. This helps you optimize your environment and maintain well-architected operation throughout its lifecycle.
For organizations moving VMware workloads to AWS, the new Workload Factory migration advisor for Amazon EVS capability offers crucial support during the assessment and planning phases of your migration.
The migration advisor serves as a central hub for designing the optimal FSx for ONTAP storage infrastructure configuration for your VMware workload when relocating to Amazon EVS. With the migration advisor, you provide the specifications you need from an external datastore, and the advisor aligns those details with FSx for ONTAP configuration guidelines, well-architected best practices, and guardrails. This helps provide the right FSx for ONTAP configuration from day one, keeping your VM relocation tasks streamlined and well executed.
Planning VMware workload relocations to Amazon EVS with the migration advisor
This section will provide a walkthrough of the Amazon EVS migration advisor process for relocating a VMware workload to an Amazon EVS environment using an NFS-based FSx for ONTAP file system as external storage.
Note that you can either have a pre-existing Amazon EVS deployment or you can configure one through this process. This walkthrough shows the process for setting up the migration before Amazon EVS is deployed. This will show how to create the datastores and apply all required ONTAP settings, which you can connect to Amazon EVS later.
To start the migration advisor review process, select the Workload Factory home page and find the VMware workload widget.
Workload Factory will offer two modes to choose from:
- Manual mode: With manual mode, you enter the capacity and performance requirements, and Workload Factory creates the plan.
- Upload inventory mode: In this mode, Workload Factory helps you discover and upload your existing VMware configuration, which Workload Factory uses to create the plan.
In this post, we’ll walk through the manual mode option. The inventory upload mode walkthrough will be published in a follow-up post.
In the Workload Factory homepage, scroll to the VMware widget, and choose Plan and Create. This will open the manual mode deployment configurations screen.
Amazon EVS environment requirements
In the next window, you will specify your Amazon EVS environment requirements.
Region: Select the AWS Region where you plan to deploy your Amazon EVS environment.
Note: FSx for ONTAP configuration options can vary between AWS Regions. When you select a Region here, Workload Factory automatically aligns the FSx for ONTAP configuration with the options available for that Region.
VM capacity: Enter values between 1 TB and 160 TB. The VM capacity value provided should be the total logical capacity occupied by the VMs that will be migrated to AWS. Workload Factory will use this value to calculate the required storage capacity for FSx for ONTAP.
Required IOPS: Select the necessary input/output operations per second (IOPS) for your Amazon EVS datastores. Be aware that FSx for ONTAP IO rates are also influenced by configured filesystem SSD capacity and throughput, which might need to be increased accordingly. Note, this value can be adjusted later.
Required throughput in Mbps: This will configure the throughput for your Amazon EVS datastores. If you need to achieve a high IO rate, set a high throughput value here, since your FSx for ONTAP file system type determines the baseline suggested IO rate. Note, this value can also be adjusted later.
Datastores count: The migration advisor automatically calculates the number of datastores you require. You also have the option to override this suggested number.
Workload Factory will recommend a datastore count that reflects the number of volumes required to achieve optimal performance based on the specific FSx for ONTAP configuration. If you manually set a lower value, Workload Factory will alert you to this fact.
Average data reduction ratio: Select the desired data reduction capacity ratio. This metric indicates how effectively data can be reduced in size through FSx for ONTAP storage efficiency features, such as data compression, deduplication, compaction, and thin provisioning.
The value that Workload Factory offers here by default is a best practice conservative estimate that can be retained in most cases. If you want to explore further and see if this number fits your needs, choose Help me decide for a recommended value based on your use case data characteristics that impact storage efficiency mechanisms.
The Help me decide button provides guidance on the appropriate ratio to choose based on your VM estate, such as whether your VM storage capacity is used by databases or media, or if the data is encrypted or compressed.
Headroom percentage: This capacity supports VM growth and serves as an interim buffer for default snapshot protection. Select a headroom percentage between 5% and 25%. The recommended value is 20%.
You can also enable VM snapshot protection. This setting will follow the default Snapshot policy, as described.
After all the values are selected, choose Review plan.
Review the migration plan
On the next page, you will review the FSx for ONTAP external datastore plan. You can also export the plan to PDF.
Suggested FSx for ONTAP configuration
First, you will be presented with a suggested FSx for ONTAP configuration that matches the input you gave about your VMware workload requirements.
This suggested configuration includes information such as required logical capacity, physical capacity, snapshot buffer, and headroom. You can also see the suggested configuration summary, including the estimated monthly cost.
You can export the plan in PDF by choosing Export plan (PDF) in the upper-right corner.
FSx for ONTAP configuration and cost analysis
Scrolling down to the next section, you can see the FSx for ONTAP configuration based on the provided details. It also provides an analysis of the estimated costs that will accrue based on the throughput capacity, IOPS, and backups.
Volume configuration
Scrolling down again, you’ll find the details of the datastores. This configuration is determined based on the user specifications provided in the first step. Workload Factory recommends a datastore count sufficient to achieve optimal performance, and then divide the required capacity—the VM capacity + headroom capacity + the Snapshot buffer capacity + automatic growth and tiering estimations—equally between datastores.
Configuration design assumptions
In this section, you are provided with the reasoning behind the solution design. These assumptions include VMware best practices, capacity-related assumptions, FSx for ONTAP design considerations, and assumptions used as the basis for cost estimations.
Choose Provision to begin the set-up process
Provisioning FSx for ONTAP and Amazon EVS datastores
You will be brought to the page for creating and configuring FSx for ONTAP file system and datastore volumes for your Amazon EVS environment.
First, you’ll see two options for creating the file system: Quick create and Advanced create. Both options will automatically build the file system based on the sizing properties in the migration plan. However, in Quick create, specific file system and network attributes will be automatically determined, while in Advanced create, you will be asked to specify these values.
Note: In both cases, there is some additional information that you’ll need to provide, such as your AWS credentials, Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC), Availability Zone preference, and your ONTAP credentials. However, it’s strongly recommended to follow all the best practices for deploying Amazon EVS datastores, as detailed by Workload Factory in the Network & Security section for Region & VPC, and AZ subnet.
In the Summary segment, you can see the Default configurations listed with their details.
There are two important areas to note when using the Advanced create option. In the Network & security section, where you set specific parameters for your system:
- In the NFS Datastores access option, you can automatically configure an FSx for ONTAP export policy that limits datastore mounting to the Amazon EVS host VLAN. This helps make the deployment more secure. Learn more in the host management VLAN subnet documentation.
For the Security group configuration, you can automatically provision a new security group that will limit inbound traffic only to ports that are mandatory for the external datastore use case and for basic management. Setting this value yourself helps to reduce the possibility of an insider attack on the environment.
Scrolling down to Plan configuration in the Summary section, you can see the settings configured by the migration advisor for the Amazon EVS environment. This includes configurations aligned with best practices for Snapshot policies, storage efficiencies, and tiering policies.
If all this checks out, choose Create at the bottom of the screen to deploy the FSx for ONTAP file system.
On the right-hand side, you’ll see the Codebox. Here, you can find an AWS CloudFormation template that you can use to automate the FSx for ONTAP for Amazon EVS external storage creation. You can either download the template, copy it, or redirect it to CloudFormation in AWS to automate the deployment.
Workload Factory is empowering seamless VMware workload relocations to Amazon EVS
NetApp Workload Factory and its VMware migration advisor are powerful tools that can help speed your VMware migrations to AWS. This free tool, which you can start using right away, simplifies and optimizes your move from on-premises VMware to Amazon EVS with FSx for ONTAP as external storage.
Workload Factory speeds up VMware relocations to Amazon EVS by building in well-architected best practices and creating infrastructure-as-code snippets, all while cutting down the time, effort, and costs of setting up and running an AWS environment.
Ready to simplify your relocation to AWS so everything runs smoothly from day one? Learn more about Workload Factory or get started now
