Hardware profiles

Owned by MS (Unlicensed)
Feb 04, 2024
8 min read

Hardware profiles are a convenient way of displaying CPU and RAM values as service levels. Hardware profiles can make it easier for your users to configure their VMs. They also enable you to control which hardware configurations are available and to recommend suitable hardware configurations for VM templates. And you can restrict users to a set of recommended hardware configurations for a template. 

Optionally, in private cloud you can create and fully manage hardware profiles and their families and types in the platform. In public cloud, you can onboard and synchronize the provider's profiles in the platform. Some cloud providers, such as VCD, may support both hardware profiles, and CPU and RAM.

 

This page describes how to manage hardware profiles for private cloud datacenters and how to synchronize hardware profiles from public cloud providers in the hybrid cloud platform. For background information, see About hardware profiles

Display hardware profiles

To display hardware profiles, go to one of these two sections of the UI.

  • Infrastructure → Public → select provider region → Hardware profiles

  • Infrastructure → Private → select datacenter → Servers view → Hardware profiles

Hardware profiles in infrastructure view
Display hardware profiles

Before you create hardware profiles in private cloud, the platform will display the default hardware profile families and types.

Classify hardware profiles in private cloud

To help users to easily select the right hardware profile for their VMs, providers usually classify hardware profiles by family and type.

The platform contains one set of default families that are available in both public and private cloud.

In private cloud and in public cloud regions without native hardware profiles, you can also create your own hardware profile families and types that will be available in all of these locations.

To classify hardware profiles, first create families, then create types.

To create a hardware profile family or type:

  1. Go to Infrastructure → Private and select a datacenter
    OR Go to Infrastructure → Public → select a region without native hardware profiles

  2. Go to Hardware profiles 

  3. At the bottom of the Types list, click the + add button and select Family or Type

  4. Complete the dialog as shown below and click Save

Create a hardware profile family

Create a hardware profile family
Create a hardware profile family

  

Create a hardware profile type

 

Create a hardware profile

You can create Abiquo hardware profiles in private cloud datacenters and for public cloud providers that do not have provider hardware profiles, such as vCloud Director clouds.

Abiquo supports dynamic hardware profiles for CPU and RAM, so the user can enter these values when they create a VM. For dynamic hardware profiles, the platform uses CPU and RAM prices, and it also applies cost codes.

Privileges: Access infrastructure view and private DCs, View datacenter details, Manage datacenter infrastructure elements

To create a hardware profile:

  1. Go to Infrastructure → Private or Public

  2. Select a location and go to Hardware profiles

  3. Click the + add button

  4. Enter the details of the hardware profile

  5. Click Save

Field

Value

Field

Value

Family

Select a family to classify the hardware profile. The family can help users understand the main purpose of the hardware profile

Type

Select a type to classify the hardware profile. The type can help users understand the performance specifications of the hardware profile

Name

Enter a unique name for the hardware profile. Identify it to users who will select it for their VMs.

CPU

The number of virtual CPUs to assign to VMs using this hardware profile. The combination of CPU and RAM must be unique in the datacenter. For dynamic hardware profiles this is the default value.

Cores per socket

The number of cores per socket to use for supported hypervisors such as VMware. The number of CPUs must be divisible by this value. For dynamic hardware profiles this is the default value.

RAM

The amount of virtual RAM to assign to VMs using this hardware profile. The combination of CPU and RAM must be unique in the datacenter. Select RAM units of MB, GB or TB. For dynamic hardware profiles, this is the default value.

Dynamic

To allow the user to enter CPU and/or RAM values, select the Dynamic option/s. Pricing and billing of dynamic hardware profiles will include cost codes, and CPU and RAM usage pricing.

Extra charges

For pricing and billing, select extra charges for the hardware profile. See Create a new cost code for an extra charge in Pricing view.

Active

Select this checkbox to activate or deactivate the hardware profile.
The platform will only display active hardware profiles to make available to an enterprise but inactive hardware profiles may be shown if they were previously selected when active.
The platform will display active hardware profiles only for selecting the recommended profiles for a template.
Users can work with active hardware profiles only.

Current generation

Select this checkbox to mark that the hardware profile is compatible with current VM templates

 

Set prices for hardware profiles

To set prices for hardware profiles using extra charges with cost codes:

  1. Create extra charges with cost codes. See “Create a new extra charge” in Pricing view

    1. For the Type select Hardware profiles or All

  2. Set values for cost codes for extra charge values. See Create a new pricing model

  3. When you create or edit a hardware profile:

    1. Go to Extra charges for cost codes

    2. Click + add and select a cost code for extra charges

    3. Click Add

    4. Add more cost codes for extra charges as required and Save

Activate hardware profiles for users and templates

After you have prepared hardware profiles, do the following steps:

  1. Activate hardware profiles for your tenants and select allowed hardware profiles. See Configure an enterprise in a cloud location

  2. By default, users can select from all custom hardware profiles for all templates. See Modify a VM template.
    You can edit a VM template to:

    1. Recommend a set of hardware profiles OR

    2. Activate a set of selected hardware profiles for each template. 

For details of how Abiquo will manage hardware profiles, see Automatic management of hardware profiles

 

 

Prevent users from working with hardware profiles

For custom hardware profiles, you can deactivate a hardware profile at any time in Infrastructure view for the selected datacenter on the Hardware profiles page. The platform will not display inactive hardware profiles to select as recommended profiles in templates or for use in VMs.

For a tenant, you can deactivate hardware profiles mode or disable a specific hardware profile that is not in use in deployed VMs, by editing the enterprise in an allowed datacenter on the Hardware profiles tab.

If you only activate a set of recommended hardware profiles for each VM template, then users will not be able to work with the other hardware profiles.

Deactivating custom hardware profiles

 If a user already is already using a hardware profile on a VM when you deactivate it, they can continue to use it until they delete their VM. In this case, the administrator can save the enterprise’s allowed datacenter with the inactive hardware profile selected.

You can activate a hardware profile again at any time. Also, the platform will automatically activate an existing hardware profile in preference to creating a new one when switching to hardware profile mode, capturing a VM, or creating a virtual appliance from a spec.

 

Delete custom hardware profiles

After you deactivate a hardware profile, you may wish to delete it.

  • You cannot delete a hardware profile if it is used in a deployed VM

  • If the administrator deletes a hardware profile, it will be automatically removed from all enterprises. This means that an undeployed VM could have no hardware profile and the user will need to select a new one before they deploy.

 

Synchronize hardware profiles with a provider

In public cloud providers with hardware profiles, when you create a public cloud region and add credentials for an enterprise, Abiquo will automatically retrieve the hardware profiles for the public cloud region.

  • Provider hardware profiles are locked and you cannot edit them

  • In public cloud regions with provider hardware profiles that also support CPU and RAM, you can deactivate hardware profiles mode

  • The platform also registers if a hardware profile is Active and if it belongs to the Current generation.

To synchronize hardware profiles: 

  1. Go to Infrastructure → Public

  2. Select Public cloud region

  3. Go to Servers view → Hardware profiles

  4. At the top right of the Hardware profiles section, select an enterprise with a public cloud account

  5. Click the round arrows refresh button

By default, for each enterprise with credentials, the hardware profiles mode is enabled. By default, all hardware profiles are available to all enterprises. 

Abiquo onboards and synchronizes all hardware profiles for each region. Some of these hardware profiles are not valid in some zones or for some VM templates, if they are not from the same generation. Users can still work with an older hardware profile, but the provider a warning or error because it will later be removed.

After you recommend the hardware profiles for a template, the platform will filter the hardware profiles by generation compatibility, subscription, and region.

Manage hardware profiles with the API

 

Related pages

 

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