vSphere - 16

The Windows 7 Release Candidate is broadly available for download today. You don't need to rush to get the RC. The RC will be available at least through July 2009 and Microsoft is not limiting the number of product keys, so you have plenty of time. So.... let’s get it right away. :-) Here are the options I’ve chosen:

• The Vista guest operating system.
• I added a virtual network adaptor (VMXNET 3)
• Memory 4 Gigabyte
• 2 CPU’s
• Upgraded the virtual VGA card to 128 MB for the Media Player
• VMware tools install went smooth

Improved large-scale management is possible with vCenter Server since it is designed from the ground up to handle the largest IT environments. A single instance of vCenter Server 4.0 manages up to 300 hosts and 3000 virtual machines and with Linked Mode you can manage up to 1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines across 10 vCenter Server instances. VMware HA and DRS clusters can support up to 32 hosts. All vCenter Server instances in a linked‐mode group can access a common view of the global data. The vSphere Client connects to other vCenter Servers using the connection information retrieved from ADAM.

With Linked mode it’s possible to create global role definitions, searches for inventory items across multiple vCenter Server instances, and a license model across multiple vCenter Servers.

With the launch of vSphere™ 4, a new certification will be available. The VMware Certified Professional (VCP) on vSphere™4 beta exam will be available 30 days post GA. Candidates eligible for the beta exam will be contacted directly by VMware.

Paths to VMware Certified Professional on vSphere 4

Continue reading "VMware Certified Professional on vSphere 4" »

I delivered my first “vSphere 4 what’s new” training this week. During the last lab, the students managed to configure VMware Fault Tolerance. After powering down one of the ESX servers the protected virtual machine switched over to the second ESX server. FT works fabulous, you can use the following checklist to make sure you configure FT the right way. Continue reading "Fault Tolerance Checklist" »

Distributed Virtual Port Groups (DV Port Groups) are port groups associated with a vDS and specify port configuration options for each member port. DV Port Groups define how a connection is made through the vDS to the Network. Configuration parameters are similar to those available with Port Groups on Standard Switches. The VLAN ID, traffic shaping parameters, port security, teaming and load balancing configuration, and other settings are configured here.

Distributed Virtual Uplinks (dvUplinks) are a new concept introduced with vDS. dvUplinks provide a level of abstraction for the physical NICs (vmnics) on each host. NIC teaming, load balancing, and failover policies on the vDS and DV Port Groups are applied to the dvUplinks and not the vmnics on individual hosts. Each vmnic on each host is mapped to a dvUplinks, permitting teaming and failover consistency irrespective of vmnic assignments. This is illustrated in the following Jing movie.

Continue reading "Distributed Virtual Port Groups and Distributed..." »

I’m in the middle of delivering the “VMware vSphere 4 : What’s New” course. This hands-on training explores the new features of vSphere 4 as well as how to upgrade to vSphere 4. I made a little movie with my Mino Flip. In this video you’ll see the complete vmguru.nl crew. :-)

At the end of the day, Erik Scholten a Solution Architect for Centric Managed ICT Services, interviewed me about my about the first vSphere training day. You can watch the complete interview here.

DB2 Express-C 9.5.2 (free to develop, free to deploy, free to distribute) contains a full-function DB2 data server, which provides an entry-level product for the Small and Medium Business (SMB) market. It comes with simplified packaging, and is easy to transparently install from within an application. It is available on Linux and Windows platforms, is fully compatible with, scalable to, and has all the autonomic manageability features of its higher priced family of offerings.

These documents describe how to configure an IBM DB2 v9.5 for Linux, Unix, and Windows (LUW) Data Server to Work with vCenter Server. These configuration tasks are mandatory to use a DB2 database with vCenter Server.

db2_prereq_connection_configuration.txt

DB_and_schema_creation_scripts_DB2.txt

After creating a Distributed Switch I was looking at my storage and noticed a new folder called “.dvsData”. It looks like this folders contains the configuration of the Distributed Switch. I think it will be used when the vCenter server is down. I extracted one of the files so you can take a look at it. 134 :-)

I’m prepping the upcoming delivery of the “What’s New in VMware vSphere 4” training course. I decided to migrate the existing virtual adapters like the kernel port group and the service console port group from a vNetwork Standard Switch to a vNetwork Distributed Switch. I also switched over the virtual machines by configuring virtual machine networking on a vNetwork Distributed Switch.

This is a short walk through from the ESX configuration guide.

Continue reading "Migrate an Existing Virtual Adapter to a..." »

VMware Data Recovery provides complete data protection for your virtual machines. Learn more about VMware Data Recovery at http://www.vmware.com/products/data-recovery/