VMware Workstation Gen 9: Part 3 Windows Core Services and Routing

Posted on January 15, 2026 Updated on January 15, 2026

A big part of my nested VCF 9 environment relies on core services. Core services are AD, NTP, DHCP, and RAS. Core services are supplied by my Windows Server (aka AD230.nested.local). Of those services, RAS will enable routing between the LAN Segments and allow for Internet access. Additionally, I have a VM named DomainTools. DomainTools is used for testing network connectivity, SSH, WinSCP, and other tools. In this blog I’ll create both of these VMs and adapt them to work in my new VCF 9 environment.

Create the Window Server and establish core services

A few years back I published a Workstation 17 YouTube multipart series on how to create a nested vSphere 8 with vSAN ESA. Part of that series was creating a Windows Server with core services. For my VCF 9 environment I’ll need to create a new Windows server with the same core services. To create a similar Windows Server I used my past 2 videos: VMware Workstation 17 Nested Home Lab Part 4A and 4B.

Windows Server updates the VCF 9 environment

Now that I have established AD230 I need to update it to match the VCF 9 networks. I’ll be adding additional vNICs, attaching them to networks, and then ensuring traffic can route via the RAS service. Additionally, I created a new Windows 11 VM named DomainTools. I’ll use DomainTools for network connectivity testing and other functions. Fig-1 shows the NIC to network layout that I will be following.

(Fig-1)

Adjustments to AD230 and DomainTools

I power off AD230 and DomainTools. On both I add the appropriate vNICs and align them to the LAN segments. Next, I edit their VMware VM configuration file changing the vNICs from “e1000e” to “vmxnet3”.

Starting with DomainTools for each NIC, I power it on, input the IPv4 information (IP Address, Subnet, VLAN ID), and optionally disable IPv6. The only NIC to get a Default Gateway is NIC1. TIP – To ID the NICs, I disconnect the NIC in the VM settings and watch for it to show unplugged in Windows Networking. This way I know which NIC is assigned to which LAN Segment. Additionally, in Windows Networking I add a verbose name to the NIC to help ID it.

I make the same network adjustments to AD230 and I update its DNS service to only supply DNS from the 10.0.10.230 network adapter.

Once completed I do a ping test between all the networks for AD230 and DomainTools to validate IP Connectivity works. TIP – Use ipconfig at the CLI to check your adapter IP settings. If ping is not working there may be firewall enabled.

Setting up RAS on AD230

Once you have your network setup correctly validate that RAS has accepted your new adapters and their information. On AD230 I go in to RAS > IPv4 > General

I validate that my network adapters are present.

Looking ahead — RAS seemed to work right out of the box with no config needed. In all my testing below it worked fine, this may change as I advance my lab. If so, I’ll be sure to update my blog.

Next I need to validate routing between the different LAN Segments. To do this I’ll use the DomainTools VM to ensure routing is working correctly. You may notice in some of my testing results that VCF Appliances are present. I added this testing part after I had completed my VCF deployment.

I need to test all of the VLAN networks. On the DomainTools VM, I disable each network adapter except for the one I want to test. In this case I disabled every adapter except for 10-0-11-228 (VLAN 11 – VM NIC3). I then add the gateway IP of 10.0.11.1 (this is the IP address assigned to my AD230 RAS server).

Next I do an ipconfig to validate the IP address, and use Angry IP Scanner to locate devices on the 10.0.10.x network. Several devices responded, plus resolving their DNS name, proving that DomainTools is successfully routing from the 11 network into the 10 network. I’ll repeat this process, plus do an internet check, on all the remaining networks.

Now that we have a stable network and core Window services established we are ready to move on to ESX Host Deployment and initial configuration.