Nutanix

Due to a number of security concerns, it was imperative to get a few Nutanix Prism Central upgraded to a recommended release. At the time of this writing, the release PC.2021.3 was used for this upgraded which was released on April 12th, 2021.

Following Nutanix best practices, we will first initiative a Nutanix Cluster Check (NCC) in Prism Central. This is done by logging into Prism Central and completing the following steps:

• Navigate to Home -> Health
• Click on ‘Run NCC Checks’
• Click ‘Run’
• Once this completes and shows 100% health check, you can proceed with the upgrade.

To begin the Prism Central upgrade, click on the settings gear in the upper-right hand corner. In the ‘Settings’ panel, click on ‘Upgrade Prism Central‘.

The current version will be displayed as well as the available compatible versions. Click on ‘Download‘ to start the Prism Central upgrade download. Then click ‘Yes’ to proceed and then ‘Continue’. Then click on ‘Upgrade Now’ to start the upgrade.

There will be an installation progress bar shown on the screen. This maybe interrupted during the upgrade due to the fact that the Prism Central server will restart during the upgrade. Once it has completed, the page should refresh and prompt for the Prism Central logon page.

Log back into Prism Central and you will be prompted with an upgrade prompt. Click Yes to confirm and refresh the page. Then check the status of the upgrade to confirm it is showing the correct current version and shows 100% with no errors.

Prism Central VM can be installed using a “1-click” method but there are some considerations to keep in mind during the install process. One of the main requirements for this 1-CLICK method is to have internet access so that the binary and metadata files can be downloaded.

Pre-requisites, outside of having internet access, is to have your Prism Element cluster configured and accessible. Once signed into your Prism Element Web-GUI you will see the ‘Not registered to Prism Central’ under the Prism Central widget. You can now follow the following steps:

• Click on the ‘Register or create new’ option from this Prism Central widget.
• Select the available version that was downloaded here. At the time of this writing 5.10.4 has been released and if Prism Element was in place for awhile you may see multiple versions that have been downloaded.
• Select the type of deployments you want:
• Single-VM: Prism Central will support up to 12.5K VMs with a default resiliency. Please note that this Single-VM is required if you want to deploy Karbon which is the Nutanix easy-to-use Kubernates solution.
• Scale-Out 3-VM: This mode supports up to 25k VMs with RF2 resiliency. Due to the design of Karbon it cannot be deployed when using a multi-VM deployment of Prism Central.
• Assign the VM name and select the container to use. It is recommended to rename the storage container when Prism Element is deployed so that it can be relevant for the cluster.
• Select your VM Size, this can be scaled up later as this simply sets the vCPU and Memory size. In the same Window, you will enter the IP address for Prism Central to use.
• Click Deploy to Deploy the VM

Deployment will show up in Prism Element as deploying in one of the progress windows in the top status bar. This normally takes about 15 minutes to complete and bring all services up. You will want to access the management URL and complete the following steps:

• Access the Management URL at: https://IPAddress:9440
• Use the default credentials to sign into this Prism Central for the first time:
• User: admin | Password: nutanix/4u
• It will prompt for your new admin password.
• You will then be prompted to enter in your new credentials and accept the Nutanix End User License Agreement.
• The last prompt will be to enable Pulse which is their phone home support tool that reports into Nutanix servers for alerting.

Your Prism Central deployment is now complete, however, there will be no Prism Element clusters added for management as this has to be done separately. Go back to your Prism Element WebGUI and complete the following steps to join Prism Central

• Under the Prism Central widget click on the ‘Register or Create New’ option once again.
• This time select ‘Join an existing Prism Central instance’
• Enter in the IP address of the Prism Central you deployed along with the new admin username and password.

After a few minutes, this cluster will be visible in the Prism Central inventory. There are a few additional steps you should complete as well before using this environment. Access the settings screen by clicking the settings gear icon in the top-right. Access the following screens and apply the applicable settings:

• HTTP Proxy: Enter in a proxy server if necessary for internet access. Internet access is used for things such as Pulse call home, firmware and build updates, Calm marketplace downloads.
• Name Servers: Enter in the name servers Prism Central should use
• NTP Servers: Enter in the time server(s) to use and this should match what is on each of your hosts so everything is synchronized to the same time server(s).
• Alert E-mail Configuration: By default Nutanix support e-mail will be here but you should add an additional e-mail for your team.
• Upgrade Prism Central: Verify you are on the latest Prism Central version, if not you can begin the download to new builds here. You also will want to download and upgrade to the latest NCC build.
• Life Cycle Management: Click Options – Perform inventory and this will automatically update the LCM framework to the newer version. This is all non-disruptive.

From this point you should look into adding Active Directory authentication or to just begin deploying VMs.