System requirements for on-premises deployments

This article lists the system requirements for the current version of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance + Operations (on-premises) deployments. Verify that the system that you're working with meets or exceeds the minimum network, hardware, and software requirements.

Dynamics 365 Finance + Operations (on-premises) can work on networks that use Internet Protocol Version 4 (IPv4) or Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6). Consider the network environment when you plan your system, and use the following guidelines.

The following table lists the minimum network requirements for the connection between the web browser and Application Object Server (AOS), and for the connection between AOS and the database in an on-premises system.

• Finance + Operations is designed for networks that have a latency of 250–300 milliseconds (ms) or less. This latency is the latency from a browser client to the datacenter that hosts Finance + Operations.
• Bandwidth requirements depend on your scenario. Typical scenarios require a bandwidth of more than 50 KBps between the browser and the server. However, we recommend higher bandwidth for scenarios that have high payload requirements, such as scenarios that involve workspaces or extensive customization. The specific amount of bandwidth depends on use.

Deployments where AOS and the Microsoft SQL Server database are in different datacenters aren't supported. AOS and the SQL Server database must be co-located.

In general, Finance + Operations is optimized to reduce browser-to-server round trips. The number of round trips from a browser client to the datacenter is either zero or one for each user interaction, and the payload is compressed.

In LAN environments, Microsoft Remote Desktop in Microsoft Windows Server isn't required in order to connect to Finance + Operations. However, Remote Desktop might be required for servicing operations on the virtual machines (VMs) that make up the server deployments.

In wide area network (WAN) environments, Remote Desktop in Windows Server isn't required in order to connect to Finance + Operations.

Finance + Operations doesn't require internet connectivity from user workstations. However, some features won't be available if there is no internet connectivity.

Most telemetry data is stored locally and can be accessed by using Event Viewer in Microsoft Windows. A small subset of telemetry events are transferred to the Microsoft telemetry pipeline in the cloud for diagnostics. Customer data and user-identifiable data aren't part of the telemetry data that is sent to Microsoft. VM names are sent to Microsoft to help with environment management and diagnostics from the LCS portal.

Consider the following domain requirements when you install Finance + Operations:

• VMs that host Finance + Operations components must belong to an Active Directory domain. Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) must be configured in native mode.
• VMs that run Finance + Operations components must have access to each other. This access is configured in AD DS.
• The domain controller must be Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 or later, and the domain functional level must be 2012 R2 or more.

For compatibility with corporate domain controllers on Windows Server 2008 R2 domain functional level (DFL), a full 2-way trust between the Windows Server 2008 R2 DFL user domain and the Windows Server 2012 R2 DFL Finance + Operations service domain is supported.

This means that users of the Finance + Operations (on-premises) application will come from the Windows Server 2008 R2 DFL domain, and the resources and service accounts hosting the Finance + Operations (on-premises) infrastructure and services will come from the Windows Server 2012 R2 DFL domain.

Examples for a full 2-way trust setup could be.

• Import of security groups from the Windows Server 2008 R2 user domain is not supported.

This section describes the hardware that is required in order to run Finance + Operations.

The actual hardware requirements vary, based on the system configuration, the data composition, and the features that you decide to use. Here are some of the factors that can affect the choice of appropriate hardware:

• The number of transactions per hour
• The number of concurrent users
• Intergration loads

Finance + Operations uses Service Fabric to host the AOS, Batch, Data management, SQL reporting, Management reporter, and Environment orchestrator services.

SQL Server must have a high-availability HADRON setup that has at least two nodes for production use.

The following illustration shows the minimum number of nodes that is recommended for your Service Fabric cluster.

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The following tables list the number of processors and the amount of random-access memory (RAM) that are required for each role that is required in order to run this deployment option. For more information, see the recommended minimum requirements for a Service Fabric standalone cluster in Plan and prepare your Service Fabric cluster.

Sizing by role and topology type

Minimum sizing estimates for production and sandbox deployments

* The recommended hardware sizes are general guidelines only. Actual hardware requirements may vary based on specific customer processes, customizations, transaction volumes, and workloads. We strongly recommend that customers conduct thorough testing of any proposed configurations as part of a comprehensive performance evaluation exercise.

** Orchestrator is designated as the primary node type and will also be used to run the Service Fabric services.

Initial estimates for the back-end SQL Server and AD DS

* SQL Server sizes are highly dependent on workloads. For more information, see Hardware sizing requirements for on-premises environments. Separate SQL Server machines for sandbox and production environments must be used. However, SQL Server can be shared in all sandbox environments.

• AOS & SSIS – Finance + Operations uses a Server Message Block (SMB) 3.0 share to store unstructured data. For more information, see Storage Spaces Direct in Windows Server 2016.

• SQL – The following options are viable:

  • A highly available SSD setup
  • A SAN that is optimized for online transaction processing (OLTP) throughputs
  • High-performance direct-attached storage (DAS)

• SQL Server and data management IOPS – The storage for both data management and SQL Server should have at least 2,000 IOPS. Production IOPS depends on many factors. For more information, see Hardware sizing requirements for on-premises environments.

• VM IOPS – Each VM should have at least 100 write IOPS.

When you set up the virtual hosts for an environment, see the guidelines in Plan and prepare your Service Fabric cluster and Describing a service fabric cluster. Each virtual host should have enough cores for the infrastructure that is being sized. Multiple advanced configurations are possible, where SQL Server resides on physical hardware but everything else is virtualized. If SQL Server is virtualized, the disk subsystem should be a fast SAN or the equivalent. In all cases, make sure that the basic setup of the virtual host is highly available and redundant. In all cases, when virtualization is used, no VM snapshots should be taken.

Finance + Operations falls under Microsoft's standard support policy regarding operation on non-Microsoft virtualization platforms – specifically VMWare. For more information, read Support policy for Microsoft software. In short, we support our products in this environment, but if we are asked to investigate an issue, we may ask the customer to first reproduce the problem without the virtualization platform or on the Microsoft virtualization platform.

The following software must be present on a computer before any Finance + Operations components can be installed:

• The Microsoft .NET Framework. See Deployment setup for version information.
• Service Fabric

For more information about Service Fabric, see Plan and prepare your Service Fabric cluster.

For the hardware requirements for SQL Server, see Hardware and Software Requirements for Installing SQL Server. |

• Only 64-bit versions of SQL Server are supported.
• Only SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS is valid for the server and database collation. For more information about how to select a collation for a SQL Server database, see the SQL Server documentation.
• In a production environment, we recommend that you install the latest cumulative update (CU) for the version of SQL Server that you're using.

• [Optional] SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS)
  • If you are using a dedicated SSIS node, you don't need to install SSIS on the AOS nodes.

• SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS)

• SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS)

Users can access Finance + Operations by using the most recent versions of these popular browsers:

• Microsoft Edge (recommended: Chromium-based Edge)
• Google Chrome
• Apple Safari

• To enable Task Recorder to capture screenshots and include them in Microsoft Word documents that are generated, you must install a pre-release Chrome extension.
• The Workflow Editor and Report Designer for Financial reporting are started as ClickOnce applications. They require a 64-bit-compatible operating system. Only Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer (on a supported version of Microsoft Windows) support ClickOnce applications out of the box. If you're using Chrome, you must install a ClickOnce extension, such as Meta4 to use ClickOnce applications. If you use Chrome in incognito mode, make sure that the ClickOnce extension is also enabled for incognito mode.
• To preview PDF files, we recommend that you use browsers such as Microsoft Edge (latest publicly available version) on Windows 10, or Google Chrome (latest publicly available version) on Windows 10, Windows 8.1, Windows 8, Windows 7, or Google Nexus 10 tablet.

Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) on Windows Server is required.

The domain controller must be Windows Server 2012 R2 or later, and the domain functional level must be 2012 R2 or more. For more information about domain functional levels, see the following pages:

• What Are Active Directory Functional Levels
• Understanding Active Directory Domain Services Functional Levels
• Full 2-way trust

The following Microsoft Office applications are supported in on-premises deployments:

• To run the Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word add-ins, you must have Microsoft Office 2016 for Windows (or newer) installed. For more information about version requirements, see Troubleshoot the Office integration.
• To view documents that are generated by the Export to Excel or Export to Word functionality, you must have Microsoft Office 2007 or later installed.

Currently, Finance + Operations doesn't include the Commerce components.