Category Archives: VMWARE

Clear Virtualization Licensing from Microsoft

Here’s an update to my previous post about Microsoft licensing on virtual infrastructure.

Mark Wilson has posted an outline of the current Microsoft licensing stance when it comes to virtualization. Thankfully it just reaffirms what I’ve thought to be the case all along, but it’s great to get it confirmed like this.

Check out markwilson.it and particularly the post called A clear virtualization licensing and support statement from Microsoft

Basically it is just a better presentation of my own analysis of the licensing terms back in December 2006.

Clear Virtualization Licensing from Microsoft (h0bbel)
Tue, 20 Nov 2007 13:51:21 GMT

Popularity: 93% [?]

Tags: esx, licensing, mark wilson, Microsoft, outline, stance, support statement, virtual, virtual infrastructure, virtualization, VMWARE

Related posts

ESX: esxtop reporting (xtravirt)

Xtravirt posted this nice little command to pipe esxtop information to a csv file

esxtop -b -d <delay in seconds> [-n <iterations>] > perfstats.csv

ESX: esxtop reporting (xtravirt)

jb

Popularity: 41% [?]

Tags: esx, VMWARE

Related posts

Network copy failed for file nvram

 

VMotion might fail if the source and target ESX Server hosts cannot resolve each other’s hostname. You might see the following error message: Network copy failed for file [storage]/foo/foo.nvram This happens most often when VitualCenter Server 2.0 is used to VMotion between ESX 2.5.3 Server hosts. Test the following before starting VMotion. Ping the hostname of the [...]

Network copy failed for file nvram
vmwarewolf
Mon, 01 Oct 2007 19:38:24 GMT

Popularity: 44% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

Student Tip: Stopping WinSCP filepart errors

 

Last week a student on my course gave me a tip. Personally, I perfer to use Veeam’s FastSCP for ESX Server when transferring files from my Windows Desktop to ESX 3. However, occasionally in the lab environments I work in I have to use WinSCP which is slower. One thing I have observed is if I copy a file such as an ISO to a VMFS volume, then WinSCP gives me an error. Basically, what happens is though the files get copied to the VMFS volume - and error occours when renaming the file from say - w2k3sp2.iso.filepart to w2k3sp2.iso. This is caused by the “Resume” feature in WinSCP which is intended to pickup an upload when it fails from where it failed, rather than starting the upload from the beginning. It appears as VMFS doesn’t support this functionality.

The solution to this problem is a work-around. To disable the “Resume” feature in the WinSCP software. I don’t mind doing this. Everything is gigabit in the lab environments I work in and very reliable so I don’t really need the resume feature. To disable the WinSCP “Resume” feature do the following:

In the menu choose, Options and Preferrences
Under Transfer, select Resume
Under “Enable transfer resume for”, select Disable
Under “Automatic Reconnect“, disable “Automatic reconnect session, if it breaks during transfer

Student Tip: Stopping WinSCP filepart errors
mikelaverick
Mon, 01 Oct 2007 12:09:50 GMT

Popularity: 56% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

Using ESXTOP to collect performance statistics

 

RTFM Reader and regular contributor, Michael Knight has contacted me with some experiences and resources concerning gathering performance statistics using esxtop at the Service Console. It’s taken me sometime to blog about this, as I have been so busy with other work - Sorry about that Michael. Anyway, this is what Michael found:

“I was recently involved in trying to troubleshoot a VM that was performing badly. During the investigation I was experimenting with methods of capturing statistics of the Host and resident VMs both from VC and ESX. I was interested in capturing the %RDY time of a VM to determine if the VM was being hindered by others on the same host. For some reason VC reports a ready time in milliseconds and not a percentage like ESXTOP which was hard to interpret easily.
Whilst tinkering I discovered that by running ESXTOP in batch capture mode for a period I could stop the capture and then load the data file straight into Microsoft’s Perfmon tool and then manipulate the various counters I was interested in if as the data was from a Windows machine. Obviously the VI3 platform has different counters but it using a familiar tool it was easier to track the info.
I have created a spreadsheet listing the available Perfmon counters. Some are self explanatory others lack detail at this time.  The information captured looks more extensive than the interactive esxtop or VC performance data. ESXTOP batch mode can be invoked as   esxtop -b > /tmp/myesxtop.csv
Please note that depending on your sample rate these files can grow very large.”

You can download Michael’s XL spreedsheet from here

Using ESXTOP to collect performance statistics
mikelaverick
Mon, 01 Oct 2007 09:49:39 GMT

Popularity: 41% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

VMware: Stopping a Virtual Machine gone haywire

 

Sometimes a Virtual Machine can’t be stopped via the VIClient. The job just hangs. There are a number of options to stop your Virtual Machine from within the Service Console. Keep in mind that these are last resort options!

  • Stopping the virtual machine by issuing the command vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/<datastorename>/<vmname>/<vmname>.vmx stop. This must be done on the ESX host where the Virtual Machine is running!
  • If this does not work, one can issue the following command: vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/<datastorename>/<vmname>/<vmname>.vmx stop hard. This will try to kill the Virtual Machine instantly.
  • A final solution is to kill the PID (process ID). Issue the following command: ps auxfww | grep <vmname> to locate the correct PID (BTW: this cannot be done via ESXTOP). The first number to appear in the output is your PID. The PID can be used to terminate the process by issuing kill -9 PID.

VMware: Stopping a Virtual Machine gone haywire
Vincent Vlieghe
Thu, 20 Sep 2007 11:50:00 GMT

Popularity: 41% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

More ESX3i Resources

 

I had hoped this week to release on RTFM some video recordings of the ESX3i product which VMworld delegates were given a complimentary copy on a memory stick. However, after further research it became clear that if I did so I would be in breach of the EULA.

Not to worry - VMware have come up with the own resources which I’ve listed below:

PDF Datasheet
PowerPoint Presentation
WebEx Webcast

More ESX3i Resources
mikelaverick
Fri, 21 Sep 2007 07:35:36 GMT

Popularity: 42% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

ESX 3i Presentation

 

Want to learn more about the new version of ESX 3, dubbed ESX 3i (Intergrated?). Then download this presentation (PDF format) it has all the information you need:

Link:

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/ESX_Server_3i_presentation.pdf

ESX 3i Presentation
mikelaverick
Tue, 18 Sep 2007 13:14:16 GMT

Popularity: 34% [?]

Tags: VMWARE

Related posts

VMworld 2007 Top Support Issues Session

Some great information from vmware, I’m going to have to find a way to go next year…

My last session of Day 3, and of the entire conference, was a super-session on the top support issues and how to resolve them.  For someone who wasn’t already familiar with some of the Service Console command-line utilities (such as esxcfg-vswitch, esxcfg-vmknic, esxcfg-vswif, etc.), this was a great session.  For someone already pretty comfortable with these tools, the session was less helpful.

The session centered around six or seven top support issues:

  1. Unable to connect to the Service Console
  2. NICs in a bond are not in the same broadcast domain
  3. Expanding a VMDK when there is an existing snapshot
  4. Corrupt snapshot (.VMSD) file
  5. Corrupt snapshot
  6. Adding extents to VMFS volumes
  7. Recovering a VMFS partition

Possible causes of problem #1 include deleting the vSwitch that houses the vswif.  To fix the problem, you can probably just switch out NICs (and use esxcfg-nics to unassign and reassign NICs to the appropriate vSwitch), adjust VLAN properties (using the esxcfg-vswitch command to modify the port group), or recreate the vswif interface (using the esxcfg-vswif command).  In some cases, it may be necessary to completely recreate the networking configuration.  The process for completely rebuilding the networking configuration looks like this:

  1. Use esxcfg-vswitch to delete all vSwitches
  2. Create a new vSwitch using esxcfg-vswitch
  3. Create a new port group for the Service Console (again, using esxcfg-vswitch)
  4. Link a physical NIC to the vSwitch
  5. Create a vswif interface (using esxcfg-vswif) and configure it with the correct IP address, subnet mask, and default gateway

Many Service Console issues relate to changing the Service Console configuration.  It’s recommended to create a “backup” Service Console connection before modifying the primary connection, in case something doesn’t work as expected.

More at Source…….

VMworld 2007 Top Support Issues Session
slowe
Fri, 14 Sep 2007 05:02:57 GMT

Popularity: 39% [?]

Tags: VMWARE, vmworld

Related posts

Microsoft details Windows licensing for 3rd party virtualization platforms

 After reading this article is sounds likes like using the datacenter version of windows is the cheapest method using ESX. As I read it you can license one copy of datacenter and run as many VM’s as you want on that machine, including on ESX…..anyone else read this the same way?

Finally Microsoft takes a clear and official position about application of Windows licensing on virtual machines hosted on 3rd party virtualization platforms (including hardware virtualization solutions like VMware ESX Server or VMware Server and OS virtualization solutions like SWsoft Virtuozzo).

In a brand new whitepaper Microsoft covers all these scenarios, including special features like VMware VMotion and client-side licensing terms, detailing:

Microsoft details Windows licensing for 3rd party virtualization platforms
Alessandro Perilli
Mon, 11 Jun 2007 12:15:00 GMT

Popularity: 71% [?]

Tags: Microsoft, VMWARE

Related posts

RSS for Posts RSS for Comments

I'm happy to use Increase Sociability.