Step-by-Step-NSX-T 3.1 design and Install-P4

In my previous post Step-by-Step-NSX-T 3.1 design and Install-P3 we have have covered deployment of edge nodes and adding them into an edge cluster.

Now our NSX-T datacenter is ready to host north south services. In order to facilitate north-south communication we need to deploy virtual router instances.

In NSX-T world these are called T0 and T1 routers.T1 routers are mainly responsible for east-west communication and T0 routers are responsible for north-south communication, this is the reason we call it a 2 tier architecture.

We are also going to follow 2 tier architecture in our deployment, this post is dedicated on deploying and configuring Tier-0 Gateway.

Deploy Virtual router for North-South, NSX-T T0 router.

In order to deploy T0 router we need to navigate to Networking tab and in the left hand menu choose Tier-0 Gateway option.

Now click on Add Gateway, you will have options Tier-0 and VRF. Choose Tier-0.

Once you select Tier-0, you will be presented with the T0 configuration page. Fill in the Name, select edge cluster and choose HA mode based on your design decisions. Click Save.

*Note: if you wish to host any stateful service on the given T0, you should be choosing HA mode as Active-Standby.

Once you click save you will get the option to further configure T0 router, choose yes.

Configure interfaces for T0 router.

Once information is saved, options which were greyed out will be available for configuration. First this is to configure interfaces of our T0 router.

In order to configure interfaces, choose interfaces.

Once you expand interfaces, click on set.

Now you will be presented with add interfaces page. Choose Add interface.

Fill in the details and add 4 interfaces in total, 2 uplinks for each edge node. One IP from each vlan.

eg01-up01    -    172.27.11.11/24

eg01-up02    -    172.27.12.11/24

eg02-up01    -    172.27.11.12/24

eg02-up02    -    172.27.12.12/24

Once all four interfaces are configured, interfaces would look like this.

Configure BGP neighbors.

Now we are done with interfaces, its time we configure BGP neighbors. In order to start configuring, we need to have below mentioned information.

1) Neighbor IP

2) BFD state enabled or disabled.

3) Timers and passwords.

Now navigate to networking and select Tier-0 Gateways. Click on 3 dots ellipsis in front of T0 router and choose edit.

Expand BGP and Add local AS according to design decision and configuration workbook.

Next click on set in front of BGP Neighbors and start adding neighbors.

Click on ADD BGP NEIGHBOR, fill in the details and save. Repeat steps for all neighbors.

Once all the neighbors are configured your screen will look like this.

Route re-distribution.

Now you only need to configure route re-distribution.

Lets get to that.

In Edit screen expand route re-distribution and click on set against route re-distribution.

Click on add route re-distribution. Enter name, set distribution and add.

Now select the routes you wish to advertise.

For filtering routes you can use route map, I am not using any. Apply and Save.

With this we have successfully configured BGP configuration after deploying Tier-0 gateway. In my next post we will configure a Tier-1 gateway for East west communication in our NSX-T datacenter.

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