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Nested Virt
IP Address Setup

Nested Hyper-V Cluster Lab on KVM

Network Architecture 

                           Home LAN (192.168.0.0/24)
                                   |
                           Router / Switch
                                   |
                            Physical NIC (eno2)
                                   |
                              Linux Bridge (br0)
                                   |
        +--------------------------+--------------------------+
        |                          |                          |
        |                          |                          |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+
|   HyperV01     |         |   HyperV02     |         |   Storage VM   |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+
| NIC1 (Mgmt)    |         | NIC1 (Mgmt)    |         | NIC1 (Mgmt)    |
| 192.168.0.11   |         | 192.168.0.12   |         | 192.168.0.20   |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+


                   Private Linux Bridge (br-iscsi)

        +--------------------------+--------------------------+
        |                          |                          |
        |                          |                          |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+
|   HyperV01     |         |   HyperV02     |         |   Storage VM   |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+
| NIC2 (iSCSI)   |         | NIC2 (iSCSI)   |         | NIC2 (iSCSI)   |
| 10.10.10.11    |<------->| 10.10.10.12    |<------->| 10.10.10.10    |
+----------------+         +----------------+         +----------------+


                  Private Linux Bridge (br-cluster)

                 +-----------------------------+
                 |                             |
                 |                             |
        +----------------+             +----------------+
        |   HyperV01     |             |   HyperV02     |
        +----------------+             +----------------+
        | NIC3 (Cluster) |             | NIC3 (Cluster) |
        | 10.10.20.11    |<----------->| 10.10.20.12    |
        +----------------+             +----------------+
          Heartbeat / Live Migration

Network Summary

NetworkLinux BridgeSubnetConnected SystemsGateway
Managementbr0192.168.0.0/24HyperV01, HyperV02, Storage VMYes (192.168.0.1)
iSCSIbr-iscsi10.10.10.0/24HyperV01, HyperV02, Storage VMNone
Clusterbr-cluster10.10.20.0/24HyperV01, HyperV02None

VM NIC Configuration

HyperV01

NICPurposeIP Address
NIC1Management192.168.0.11
NIC2iSCSI10.10.10.11
NIC3Cluster / Live Migration10.10.20.11

HyperV02

NICPurposeIP Address
NIC1Management192.168.0.12
NIC2iSCSI10.10.10.12
NIC3Cluster / Live Migration10.10.20.12

Storage VM

NICPurposeIP Address
NIC1Management192.168.0.20
NIC2iSCSI Target10.10.10.10

The Storage VM does not require a Cluster network adapter because it is not a member of the Hyper-V Failover Cluster.

Traffic Flow

Management Network (br0)

  • Active Directory
  • DNS
  • RDP
  • Hyper-V Manager
  • Windows Admin Center
  • Internet Access
  • VM Client Traffic

iSCSI Network (br-iscsi)

  • HyperV01 ⇄ Storage VM
  • HyperV02 ⇄ Storage VM
  • CSV Storage
  • MPIO (optional)

No gateway configured.

Cluster Network (br-cluster)

  • Cluster Heartbeat
  • Live Migration
  • CSV Redirected I/O (optional)

No gateway configured.

Result

Each Hyper-V host has three dedicated networks:

  • Management → Production LAN
  • iSCSI → Shared Storage
  • Cluster → Heartbeat & Live Migration

This closely mirrors a production Hyper-V cluster while remaining completely contained inside a single KVM host.

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