ESX/ESXi/vCenter Ports

Here is a link to a great PDF diagram outlining all of the network port requirements for your virtual environment. Great resource to have, and your firewall admin will love you! vSphere Network Ports

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Network Ports

ESX vs Hyper-V…VMware vs Microsoft

Like most others out there, I have recently started hearing the ESX/VMware vs Hyper-V/Microsoft questions popping up throughout my day. Check here to get my thoughts!

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Microsoft vs VMware

ESX/ESXi root login over SSH

This is an old one, but worthy of documentation… By default root login over SSH is disabled in ESX 3.X and vSphere 4.X. While it is best practice for security to leave this disabled, from time to time a situation [...]

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putty

VCB End of Life announced

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Received this a few minutes ago.. will have to see what’s up next with Legato Networker in terms of utilizing the new vSphere API’s!

Dear Valued Customer,
The purpose of this letter is to inform you of our vSphere backup product strategy, ongoing enhancements, and end of availability plans for VMware Consolidated Backup.
VMware Backup Product Strategy
VMware released vStorage APIs for Data Protection (VADP) with the vSphere 4.0 release in May, 2009. VADP is the next generation of VMware’s backup framework. We have also been working with several backup partners to integrate VADP into their solutions to make backup of vSphere Virtual Machines fast, efficient and easy to deploy compared to VCB and other backup solutions. Several of our major backup partners have already released VADP integrated backup products and we expect most of the major backup partners to have VADP integrated backup software by the upcoming feature release of the vSphere platform in 2010.
Future Product Licensing
Given the strong interest and adoption of VADP by our backup eco-system and the benefits offered by VADP compared to VMware Consolidated Backup (VCB), we are announcing the End of Availability for VCB starting with next vSphere feature release in 2010. Starting with the next vSphere platform feature release, VCB will be removed from vSphere platform. VADP integrated backup products (including VMware Data Recovery) will be the recommended option for efficient backup and restoration of vSphere Virtual Machines. This will allow us to focus new value added feature development on VADP instead of two backup frameworks (VCB and VADP). You can find more information about the use of vStorage APIs for Data Protection in our Developer Community. For information on the availability of VADP integrated release of your backup product please contact your backup vendor.
End of Availability
With the release of the next vSphere platform, we will continue to provide the binaries for VCB, but they will not be compatible with the next platform release. We will continue to provide support for VCB on the current vSphere platform per the VMware support policy.
If you need assistance in the migration from VMware Consolidated Backup to the vStorage APIs for Data Protection, please contact your local reseller or storage backup vendor.

Can’t say I’m disappointed, but where’s Networker support for the new API’s?!?

ESX vs Hyper-V…VMware vs Microsoft

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Like most others out there, I have recently started hearing the ESX/VMware vs Hyper-V/Microsoft questions popping up throughout my day. While I have little experience with Hyper-V,  R2 certainly brings an impressive amount of features and several compelling arguments for it’s use over VMware’s product offerings. If you are a small to medium sized shop running only Windows servers with minimal workloads, then you probably need to give Hyper-V a hard look. That being said, I personally still think that vSphere is THE elite solution for virtualization in the enterprise, and will continue to be for the next 3-5 years. The giant that is Microsoft will continue to invest in their hyper-visor offering, and I think we all expect it will compete feature for feature with ESX/vCenter at some point.

I have  recently read some excellent articles and white papers discussing the pros and cons of each. I have a feeling I personally will need to similar comparisons some time in the near future, and will rely on a few of these as references.

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/datacenter/?p=1820

http://ctistrategy.com/2009/08/18/vmware-vsphere-microsoft-hyperv-whitepaper/

http://www.zdnetasia.com/techguide/storage/0,39045058,62060189,00.htm

It is important to consider all of the factors listed in these articles when deciding which technology is right for you. The Microsoft vs VMware battle has been going on for quite some time (http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/2008/07/22/the-microsoft-vs-vmware-fud-wars-let-battle-commence/) and probably will continue on for the foreseeable future.

vSphere Mini Monitor – Cool Tool!

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Since the primary objective of this blog is centered around tips and tricks I come across during my day to day work, I will from time to time give props to a tool out there that really changes how I do things. There are so many folks out there working on these types of tools/apps, it is a rare week I don’t come across something new that makes my life easier.

vSphere Mini Monitor is one of those tools! (see link in the ToolBox). What started as vSphere Session Monitor as v1.0, has gone to v2.0 and added a bunch of new features. The basic idea behind the tool is giving admins of VMware virtualization an easy way to receive alerts (real time) about key user based events within their virtual infrastructure. The tool provides 4 “channels” to deliver the alerts.

Give it a download and check it out!

Map a “GDrive” using Gladinet Cloud Desktop for Google Docs

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With Google Docs now supporting uploads of ANY file and a limit peaking at 1GB of file storage, I have been making an effort to utilize the service more. Today I went searching for a free tool to allow me to map this “cloud storage” as a network drive. Surprisingly, there aren’t too many options out there. Google offers a widget for Google Desktop, but I was looking for a lightweight application, and not a whole desktop/suite solution. I came across Gladinet Cloud Desktop. After a quick download and install,  then adding credentials for my Google Docs account, I now have a mapped drive to my own cloud storage! The free version is apparently limited feature wise, but if it works as advertised I have no problem purchasing the full version should I need the advanced features. Hopefully by the time I need to do this, Google will have released a GDrive app of their own!

Professional Edition ($39.99) adds significant value to the Starter Edition with improvements in Security, Performance, Usability and Configurability. It also provides an advanced backup manager, Google Docs backup, and allows an unlimited number of file transfers.

The application also works with several other services, even if you don’t use Google Docs, supports drag and drop, and several options to back up your data!

Give Gladinet Cloud Desktop a try by downloading it HERE.

Windows System Properties – Manufacturer

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When P2V’ing a server to ESX or vSphere, there is a small list of “clean-up” items that must be done to the new virtual image. I have added an additional item to my list that will modify the custom text and images that computer manufacturers add to the system properties dialogue box. Often when running an IBM or Dell server, this dialogue box will still list old system information (make/model) and sometimes will include an OEM image. Once the server is virtual, I think it’s nice to remove these items completely.

OEM Info

To do this, you must edit OEM.INFO in your local system directory.  You can replace the text with the following default template (customize for your own use):
[General]
Manufacturer=Your Company, Inc.
Model=Your Computer Model
SupportURL=http://your.support.site/
LocalFile=c:\your\local\support\file.htm
[Support Information]
Line1=first line
Line2=second line
Line3=third line
Line4=fourth line
...
LineN=nth line
; Create as many lines as you need by incrementing the Line number

Secondly, to modify or add an image to the properties area, you must add a standard windows bitmap called OEMLOGO.BMP to your system directory. The logo must be 172×172 in size. Simply delete the existing OEM image should you prefer no image at all.

There is also an easy to use, freeware app to help you do this, should you prefer…Click Here.

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