In a previous blogpost I showed how-to repurpose old Nutanix hardware for a lab, by running Nutanix Community Edition on it.
Now let’s try to do the same but with the latest Community Edition (2.1) and an even older cluster (NX-3060-G4) and try to update it to the latest versions available at the moment. And then lets look what this old baby still has in it 😉
Here is my IP-Cheat-Sheet for the config:
- Node 1:
- IPMI: 10.0.2.1
- AHV: 10.0.2.11
- CVM: 10.0.2.21
- Node 2:
- IPMI: 10.0.2.2
- AHV: 10.0.2.12
- CVM: 10.0.2.22
- Node 3:
- IPMI: 10.0.2.3
- AHV: 10.0.2.13
- CVM: 10.0.2.23
- Cluster Virtual IP: 10.0.2.30
- Cluster Data Services IP: 10.0.2.31
- Prism Central IP: 10.0.2.32
I’m not covering how-to install CE on the nodes as this is described in my previous blog post. I’m using a bootable USB drive to install it.
After installation I created the cluster and after that my default configurations:
Now lets upload the latest bits (as for now ;)) of AHV and AOS:
And upgrade to those versions:
Prism Central:
Deploying Prism Central on Community Edition requires a working portal.nutanix.com account. If you are a customer or working for a partner then you will have one. Download the latest version and deploy is. For me this is version 2024.2
Enable the 90 day ultimate trial and you can play (for 90 days duhhh) with all the cool features. That would be enough to learn the whole stack and get certified 😉 Did I already say you can book the official nutanix training at my company? https://www.tielenconsultancy.nl 😉
X-Ray:
Oké lets run some X-Ray test on it. I’m running the peak performance microbenchmark test. This will show me some cool stats about maximum read and writes this cluster can handle.
Windows Server 2025:
Let see if I can run some modern workloads on it. Lets start with Windows 2025:
- Create the ISO for this: https://www.jeroentielen.nl/slipstream-virtio-drivers-into-windows-iso-to-use-on-nutanix-ahv/
- How-to create this type of VM: https://www.jeroentielen.nl/windows-11-vdi-on-nutanix-with-secure-boot-credential-guard-and-vtpm/
Nutanix Kubernetes Platform:
Now lets switch over to Jonas his awesome blogpost series about NKP:
- https://jonashogman.com/nkp-post-1-preparing-the-setup-environment/
- https://jonashogman.com/nkp-post-2-setting-up-a-local-registry-with-harbor-to-avoid-hitting-rate-limits-at-docker-io/
- https://jonashogman.com/nkp-post-3-deploying-the-nkp-mgmt-cluster/
- https://jonashogman.com/nkp-post-4-adding-infrastructure-providers-and-identity-providers/
- https://jonashogman.com/nkp-post-5-provisioning-your-first-kubernetes-cluster-in-nkp/
And do all those steps on this old baby.
Nutanix Database Service:
End 😉
Well you get the point, the old legacy hardware is still capable to run the latest and greatest for in your home lab.
Excellent post as usually, Jeroen!
After some time playing with NCE I am looking now to start learning how to properly deploy NTNX in production, which means I need to get more in contact with Foundation and all good stuff when deploying the commercial version. Since I need to do it by myself (home lab) and my question is how to get the hardware, but needs to be affordable with a good cost/benefit.
Looking for I found HPE DL380 Gen10 2x Xeon Silver 4110 and seems to be a good option. Just looking for someone to share any thoughts, specially confirming that the commercial version could be installed (again, only for Lab reasons).
Can you share your thoughts on this? Any other affordable alternative to start with?
Thanks!
Hi Chris, what you can do is look at amazon/ebay for older clusters/nodes. But be verry carefull to get what they sell. I’ve heard horror stories that a G6 is delivered when G7 was promised. And nodes without ram, cpu, disks.
What also is a possibility to hire a cluster here: https://www.tielenconsultancy.nl/nutanix-cluster-rental/ where you can do your foundation learning on 😉 (shameless crosspost hahahaha)