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VCF 9.1 - Deploying VCF Management Services (VCFMS) with Custom IP Allocation using SDDC Manager API

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One of the new steps when upgrading an existing VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 5.x or 9.0.x environment to VCF 9.1 is deploying the new VCF Management Services (VCFMS) component using SDDC Manager.


Unlike a brand new VCF 9.1 deployment using the VCF Installer, the VCFMS deployment workflow during an upgrade requires the VCF Services runtime network to be specified using a CIDR format rather than an IP Range, which can also be tricky if you do not have a contiguous IP address block.


Users can choose from additional IP allocation options, but you will need to use the SDDC Manager API, as I recently shared in this blog post.

UPDATE: Using the latest July EP, you no longer need to use the SDDC Manage or Fleet LCM API to use IP List allocation type for deploying VCFMS as this is now available in the product UI.

To demonstrate this new SDDC Manager API, I have put together a quick PowerShell script called deploy_vcf_management_service_with_custom_ip_allocation.ps1 that simplifies the deployment of VCFMS using a custom IP allocation method.

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VCF 9.1 - VCF Download Tool (VCFDT) Cheatsheet

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The latest release of VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) Download Tool (VCFDT), which ships as part of VCF 9.1, includes a number of enhancements for downloading VVF and VCF installation and upgrade binaries.

For new users of VMware Cloud Foundation Download Tool (VCFDT), I thought it would be useful to put together a quick cheat sheet covering some of the most common workflows, ranging from configuring an activation code and downloading the required VCF 9.1 binaries for initial deployments and upgrades, to the new workflow for downloading ESX patches and updates.

I have even found myself repeatedly using the --help command just to locate a specific option or workflow, so hopefully this serves as a useful reference for both new and existing users, including myself! 😅

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ESX Passthrough of AMD Ryzen Integrated Graphics (iGPU)

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I recently had a conversation with Wenchao (creator of AMD Zen4/Zen5 IPMI Thermal Driver for ESX Fling and Realtek Network Driver for ESX Fling) about the incredible work he has done to support the VMware/Broadcom community. His latest contributions has really closed the capability gap when running ESX on popular AMD Ryzen platforms like the Minisforum MS-A2, which been an ideal system for running VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9.1 in a lab environment.

The only remaining capability we have not yet been able to take advantage of is the integrated graphics (iGPU) on modern AMD Ryzen systems, which have become surprisingly powerful for running AI models.

While this has been a topic I have researched quite extensively and even spent time debugging with Engineering, it is always great to get a new perspective on things. I kid you not, a few days later Wenchao came back with a solution that had a few caveats which I was able to help iron out with some of my prior experience in this area. 😆

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