Add a Virtual Switch to Connect to a Managed Switches’ Mirror/SPAN Port

Netscope is running as a virtual machine on the ESXi host/server. Therefore we need to add a virtual network adapter to connect Netscope VM’s internal capture port to a physical network port on the ESXi host/server. This external port would then be connected to the managed switches’ mirror/SPAN port using an ethernet cable. The mirrored traffic could then be monitored with the Netscope VM’s capture port.

To configure the managed switch see Set-up Network Switch for Port Mirroring.

To add the connecting Virtual Switch:

1. Select the ESXi host from the left-hand side menu.
2. Click ‘Configuration’ from the tabbed menu.
3. Select ‘Networking’ from the left-side menu within ‘Configuration’.
4. Click ‘Add Networking’. We want to create a new virtual switch and point it to a physical network port on the ESXi server.

The ‘Add Network Wizard’ window will appear. You want to create a connection for a ‘Virtual Machine’. Click ‘Next’.

1. Select ‘Create a vSphere standard switch’.
2. Choose an unused ‘vmnic’ which will be one of the physical network ports on the ESXi server. This port would then have an ethernet cable to connect it to the managed switches’ mirror/SPAN port.
3. Click ‘Next’.

1. Change the ‘Network Label’ to something meaningful for your setup. Here it’s called ‘switch for mirroring’.
2. Click ‘Next’.

Next, we will see a summary of the virtual switch we have just created. Click ‘Finish’.

Once created, you’ll need to Set Virtual Switch to Accept Promiscuous Mode.