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mshoaib's avatar
mshoaib
Icon for Cirrus rankCirrus
Sep 18, 2024

Adding New BigIP Units Using Free CPUs on i7800 (LB13 & LB14) to an existing HA Pair

Hello, We have a pair of i7800 devices, each running two guests with the following configuration: i7800 Unit 1: LB09 & LB11 i7800 Unit 2: LB10 & LB12   Current Setup: LB09 & LB10: These are par...
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  • F5_Design_Engineer's avatar
    F5_Design_Engineer
    Sep 24, 2024

    Hi mshoaib,

     

    To my understanding i7800 supports only 12 vCPU not 14 vCPU, as per written in f5 Documentation.

    Can you please check again and share the vCMP host , and number of vCPU supported, is it 12 or is it 14.

     

    Please refer:

    https://my.f5.com/manage/s/article/K14218

     

    https://wtit.com/f5-resources/vcmp-guest-memory-cpu-core-allocation-matrix/

    Please mark it as solution in case if you feel your query has been responded and saved your time and giving pointers toward resolving your issue, as it will help other to use your query scenario to solve their similar issue.

     

    Best Regards,

    F5 Design Engineer

     

mshoaib's avatar
mshoaib
Icon for Cirrus rankCirrus

Thank you for the detailed explanation!

I followed all the suggested commands, and after running them on my system, I can confirm that my setup also shows only "12" CPUs. Your guidance helped me clarify the situation.

Below is part of the commands output:

[mshoaib@XXXXXXXXX:Active:Standalone] ~ # tmsh show sys cpu all | grep "CPU:"
CPU: 0 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 1 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 2 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 3 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 4 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 5 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 6 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 7 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 8 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 9 (clock ticks)   Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 10 (clock ticks)  Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
CPU: 11 (clock ticks)  Last 5 sec  Last 1 min  Last 5 min   Total
[mshoaib@XXXXXXXXX:Active:Standalone] ~ #


[mshoaib@XXXXXXXXX:Active:Standalone] ~ # tmsh show sys hardware
......
......
Hardware Version Information
  Name        cpus
  Type        base-board
  Model       Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-1650 v4 @ 3.60GHz
  Parameters  --            --
              cache size    15360 KB
              cores         12  (physical:6)
              cpu MHz       3601.000
              cpu sockets   1
              cpu stepping  1

xxxxxxx

xxxxxxx

Platform
  Name  BIG-IP i7800
  BIOS Revision  OBJ-0645-xx BIOS: 5.20.030.0 ME: 6.0.50.1252 05/06/2019
  Base MAC       00:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
  PVA Version    20

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I plan to remove the "Guest" VM on the unit to address the discrepancy on the GUI.

F5_Design_Engineer's avatar
F5_Design_Engineer
Icon for MVP rankMVP
Sep 27, 2024

Hi Mshoaib,

Thanks for the update.

I would highly recommend not to try to deploy one Guest showing 2 extra vCPU without consulting in F5 TAC by opening a TAC case for your situation about 14 vCPU displaying in GUI, it may cause unexpected results for your 2 other vCMP guest may got crashed or contingency in prod environment can cause further outage.

As per F5 documentation there are 12 vCPU mentioned every where so in case if you try to add one more vCMP guest showing with available 2 extra vCPU, in case if it fails the F5 TAC may not support your  case based on the documentation.

I would not recommend to take a change which contains lots of risk.

You can still open a TAC case before to get a confirmation if its a software glitch or is it possible to use 2 additional vCPU as showing in the GUI, to save the situation.

 

In My GUI have used 8 vCPU and if i try to create a new vCMP guest the available cores it is showing as 6, that means total 14 vCPU cores in GUI , but i have a production boxes so i cant try making a new vCMP guest which could use remaining 6 vCPU cores, it may crash my i7800 Software/hardware as i face already Hardware crash during OS upgrade from 14.x to 15.x which they said first reboot a box before upgrade a normal plain upgrade and after that try OS upgrade from 14.x to 15.x and it was successful, with no hardware failure on the physical host i7800.

That all i can share for the moment as we don't have test boxes in test LAB for i7800 so my comments for 14 vCPU showing in GUI will not be a right  as my answer will not be base on real test results whether it will fail or not if i try to use all 14 vCPU instead of 12 vCPU as per the CLI or as per the f5 i7800 documentation for 12 vCPU cores available.

 

If my replies help you answer your query , could you please mark my reply as solution so that it will be helpful for our blog other viewers.

Please feel free to reach out to me for any further discussion on this topic any time, and i will be glad to assist you.

 

HTH

Best regards,

F5 Design Engineer.