Enable NVMe over RDMA or NVMe over TCP Software Adapters

ESXi supports NVMe over RDMA and NVMe over TCP software adapters. Use the vSphere Client to enable the software storage adapters for NVMe over RDMA and NVMe over TCP.

Prerequisites

• On your ESXi host, install an adapter that supports the following types of storage.
  • NVMe over RDMA adapter. For example, Mellanox Technologies MT27700 Family ConnectX-4.
  • NVMe over TCP adapter. For example, i40en.
• Configure the VMkernel binding for your adapters.
  • For NVMe over RDMA, see Configure VMkernel Binding for the RDMA Adapter.
  • For NVMe over TCP, see Configure VMkernel Binding for the NVMe over TCP Adapter.

Procedure

1. In the vSphere Client, navigate to the ESXi host.
2. Click the Configure tab.
3. Under Storage, click Storage Adapters, and click the Add Software Adapter icon.
4. Select the adapter type as required.
   • NVMe over RDMA adapter
   • NVMe over TCP adapter
5. Depending on your selection in Step 4, select an appropriate RDMA adapter or TCP network adapter (vmnic) from the drop-down menu.
   Note: If you get an error message that prevents you from creating the software adapter, make sure that the VMkernel binding for the adapter is configured correctly. For more information, see Configure VMkernel Binding for the RDMA Adapter and Configure VMkernel Binding for the NVMe over TCP Adapter.

Results

The software NVMe over RDMA and NVMe over TCP adapters appear in the list as vmhba storage adapters. You can remove the adapters if you need to free the underlying RDMA and TCP network adapter for other purposes.