You can add new hosts to an existing VxRail cluster to provide more capacity.

If the vSphere cluster hosts an NSX Edge cluster, you can only add new hosts with the same management, uplink, host TEP, and Edge TEP networks (L2 uniform) as the existing hosts.

If the cluster to which you are adding hosts uses a static IP pool for the Host Overlay Network TEPs, that pool must include enough IP addresses for the hosts you are adding. The number of IP addresses required depends on the number of pNICs on the ESXi hosts that are used for the vSphere Distributed Switch that handles host overlay networking. For example, a host with four pNICs that uses two pNICs for host overlay traffic requires two IP addresses in the static IP pool.

Prerequisites

  • Image the new node(s).
  • Discover and add new node(s) to the cluster using the VxRail Manager plugin for vCenter Server. See the Dell documentation.

Procedure

  1. In the navigation pane, click Inventory > Workload Domains.
  2. In the workload domains table, click the name of the workload domain that you want to expand.
  3. Click the Clusters tab.
  4. Click the name of the cluster where you want to add a host.
  5. Click Actions > Add VxRail Hosts.
  6. Select the cluster expansion type.
    This option only appears if the vSphere cluster hosts an NSX Edge cluster.
    Option Description
    L2 Uniform Select if all hosts you are adding to the vSphere cluster have the same management, uplink, host TEP, and Edge TEP networks as the existing hosts in the vSphere cluster.
    L2 non-uniform and L3 You cannot proceed if you any of the hosts you are adding to the vSphere cluster have different networks than the existing hosts in the vSphere cluster. VMware Cloud Foundation does not support adding hosts to L2 non-uniform and L3 vSphere clusters that host an NSX Edge cluster.
  7. On the Discovered Hosts page, enter the SSH password for the host and click Add.
  8. On the Thumbprint Verification page, click Confirm fingerprint icon to confirm the SSH thumbprints for the ESXi hosts.
  9. On the Validation page, wait until all of the inputs have been successfully validated.
    If validation is unsuccessful, you cannot proceed. Use the Back button to modify your settings and try again.
  10. Click Finish.