Installing Azure Local and connecting to ARC with App Configurator

If like me you are using validated nodes for Azure Local deployment then you essentially need to start from scratch with a bit of tin with nothing installed. In this post I will walk through getting your validated nodes ready for creating an Azure Local Cluster.

1. Step one is always make sure that your hardware is running the latest firmware so spend the painful hour or so making sure that the hardware is running latest firmware. In my case I am Using HPE DL360 G10 nodes so I just downloaded the full service pack from HP and booted from the ISO before I started.

   
   

   Also check in the BIOS you have Secure Boot enabled, TPM 2.0 installed and enabled and also your Network Cards have RDMA enabled this will just save you having to come back later and do it.

2. Now from the Azure Portal download the Deployment OS that you can get from Azure Arc > Azure Local.

   
   

   In this example I used 2503 because I know it worked and didn't feel the risk of finding new deployment bugs in 2505 was worth it. :)

3. Mount the ISO to your node via ILO or use Rufus to create a bootable USB (will be quicker) then install the OS just like any other Windows OS. As a general good practise and to avoid validation errors with the installed disks use DiskPart to clean the disks on your node prior to installation.

   
   

   Shift F10

   diskpart

   list disk

   select <Disk>

   clean

   
   

   

   

4. Now the OS is installed you can set an Administrator password at the logon screen and make sure its complex enough for the Azure GUI not to complain at you at a later stage, also use same passwords on all nodes for the build process, it gets disabled later.

   
   

   

Set your Computer Name followed by enabling Remote Desktop (temporarily) and configure your network settings assigning the correct NIC a static IP address and DNS server. When I say correct NIC I am talking about the NIC you will be using for production traffic not storage assuming you are separating this traffic.

5. The next step is to make sure that you install the vendor drivers for your Network cards as the Microsoft generic drivers will not work and will fail validation.

   
   

   In my case I have 3 different network cards installed on my Nodes. The embedded 1GB NICs that are not used (Installed drivers anyway as good practise) my embedded HPE 10/25GB NICs that I am using for RDMA and also a Broadcom PCIe NICs 10/25GB that I am using for Network traffic. 3 different drivers to Install.

I created an ISO with the drivers and mounted them and for the Broadcom driver I used pnputil to install the .inf file as you can see below but this will just depend on your own set up.

DO NOT LEAVE ISOs MOUNTED ON THE NODES OTHERWISE DEPLOYMENT WILL FAIL

6. On each node its worth verifying RDMA is enabled and running and the network cards are using their vendor driver.

From PowerShell run Get-NetAdapterRDMA and you should see enabled and operational set to True.

Run Get-NetAdapter and you will see the name and status of each adapter on the node. You will see in my example Port6 and Port7 are for my switchless storage configuration and Port 5 is for my Production traffic. (yes I only patched one, its a lab)

run Get-NetAdapter -name "<Name>" | select Driver* and check that the DriverProvider does not read Microsoft as shown below.

7. Now we are ready to connect to Azure ARC, Download the App Configurator from here and install. At time of writing this is still in preview but it makes things so much easier, I would however like to see the ability to do multiple nodes at once instead of 1 at a time. (Microsoft if you are listening)

   
   

   Open the Configurator App and enter your IP followed by Username and Password.

This will now log you onto the Node, select Start .

It should now look like this.

Select Next and then edit network settings if the correct interface is not shown automatically like below.

When you select Edit and select the correct interface you will automatically see the correct settings on that port just select Apply.

Basics screen will now look like this and you can select next.

On the Arc agent setup screen enter the required information, I added the Tenant ID and left Arc Gateway ID out as it wasn't mandatory. Make sure you Copy into a notepad as you will do this for each node.

Review the information and select finish.

The configuration will begin but pay attention as you will need to logon when the GUI prompts you for the Device Code.

A few minutes later it should look something like this.

Repeat this for each Node to connect to Azure ARC then from the Azure Portal you should be able to view your connected Nodes ready to create your cluster. ensure before you do that you have completed the AD prep steps here