Malaysia VMware Communities » ESX 4

Import Virtual Machine with VMware Converter 4

craig — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 18:43:41 +0000

New finding while trying to import the existing virtual machine from ESX 3.5 to vSphere 4 ESX host. I got an image from previous ESX 3.5 which is running hardware version 4. I was trying to import it to the new ESX 4.0 through the import wizard, and been failed for couple of times. During the wizard, it allow you to change the virtual machine name, thin provision, disable unnecessary services and upgrade to virtual hardware version 7. I had selected the necessary configuration but non of it were success. It had always failed at the stage of 12 % during the import process. I even had browse the datastore to monitor the progress, for unknown reason, the task will be failed for no reason, which not even a packet was drop during the process.

I decide to do a final round of import which keep every single configuration as default. All the configuration of the existing VM had not been changed and it works. After the success import, I had to manually update the vmtools and virtual hardware version. I had also cloned the virtual machine to the new VM name that I wanted to, with thin provision enable. It had been taken 6 hours for the entire import process, which is consider long as the virtual machine image was 400GB. I will suggest to leave the default setting for future import process as it shown as more consistent process. The rest of the configuration always can be done right after the success import.

VMware vSphere 4

craig — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 05:42:28 +0000

VMware vSphere 4 will be officially launch tonight at 9am PDT time zone. As we are sitting in Asia, there are 15 hours different away from us, and most of the guys may not able to join the web cast tonight.

VMware vSphere is the industry’s first cloud operating system, transforming IT infrastructures into a private cloud—a collection of internal clouds federated on-demand to external clouds—delivering IT infrastructure as an easily accessible service. Enable the next generation of flexible, reliable IT services with the efficiency and low cost of cloud computing—featuring uncompromising control over service levels.

Below is a quick screen shot which explain the new licensing model which will apply for the vSphere 4 the next generation of ESX Server from VMware.

Official VMTN Blog

Now the licensing model will be separated to 3 different categories. Standard, Advanced, Enterprise and Enterprise plus. The additional differences within Enterprise plus and Enterprise is only about the 3rd party multipathing, distributed switch and host configuration control.

There are also quite a number of changes in the new license model, which you may need to refer here.

Again, you may check out VMware vSphere 4 key features is here.

Storage VMotion through GUI in vSphere

craig — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 07:51:17 +0000

Storage Vmotion through GUI is available on next version of ESX vSphere. This had provided the capability to perform the storage Vmotion from 1 to another datastore with no downtime. The entire process is been simplified through graphic user interface. Full features been integrated to vCenter without external plugin.

Select Change datastore at the 1st screen. Note that the option 1 is use for Vmotion on virtual machines. Option 3 is only available when VM is been powered off

Select the right datastore you wish to move your VM and click next to continue

Validation success and choose the option you need from here. 1st option will remain the original configuration of the VM. 2nd option will go for thin provisioned format. 3rd option will be thick format for full allocation of the virtual machine. Press next and you are ready to go for storage Vmotion.

This features is excellent as it simplify the storage vmotion process to the administrators.

Storage Management in VMware vSphere

craig — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 03:50:14 +0000

There are some new features build up for the next version of ESX server and vCenter, which will simplify and improve the manage capability of the Virtual Infrastructure from vCenter.

Datastore outlook from Storage tab

Dedicated Storage view from inventory list. This allow users to view the datastore utlization and others information

Map View within VMs, storages, ESX hosts, Clusters, and Data Center.

I had been very impressed with the new interface and enjoy my time with it.

VMware ESX 4

craig — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:02:17 +0000

According to VMware Seminar today, the future of the VMware Enterprise Edition Virtualization which name as ESX 4 will be launched next year, will contain some of the features which been show case during the seminar to the public. Below is some of the information which had been shared by VMware for reference

1. 64 bits kernel VS the current 32 bits kernel on ESX server
2. Thin Provisioning
3. Fault Tolerance
4. 8 way virtual SMP
5. 256 GB memory per single VM

There are more to come in the road map of year 2009 which will be specified on the Vcloud, virtual data center and etc. At lease for today, this had been presented to the end user about some of the technology road map and features in the next version. ESX 4 is still under private beta test at this moment, which aim to be launched at 1st quarter next year.

Yo! VMware Workstation 6.5.1

jlchannel — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 15:39:10 +0000

VMware Workstation 6.5.1 have been released.

VMware Workstation Version 6.5.1 | 21 NOV 2008 | Build 126130
Last Update: 21 NOV 2008

What’s New?

Japanese localization — A localized version of Workstation is now available in Japanese for Windows hosts.
Note: Technical Support services for Workstation are currently delivered in English. Japanese-speaking support engineers are available in a limited capacity during the operating hours of the local support center. For more information, see VMware local language support.
Smart card support for Linux guests — Smart cards are now experimentally supported with Linux guests.
Unity mode on Linux guests — Although support for Unity mode on Linux guests is still experimental, repainting of application windows is much improved.
3-D graphics — Additional improvements have been made to improve 3-D performance on Windows XP guests.

Beside this, NTPRO said you will be able to run ESX 4 under VMware Workstation 6.5.1. Cool!

By the way, I’m downloading VMware Workstation 6.5.1 32bit and 64 bit for Windows (499 MB) and the speed is just below 100KB/sec. WTF? Stupid Malaysia ISP TMNUT?

ESX 4 and ESX 4i is on the way out

craig — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 13:44:55 +0000

As what had been demo and shared during the VMworld 2008, most of you guys may aware that the ESX 4.0 or ESX 4i is on the way out and currently may still in development and beta test by VMware. Some of the features been demo example as the fault tolerance which is an interesting features that most of us will be willing to have a look on it. Beside that, VMware is also ready to allow more than 4 vcpu per VM from this version. Although the HyperV and Xen had supported up to 32 virtual cpu per VM. With ESX4, this will bring VMware back on track with the necessary powerful environment to be run in virtualization world. If we need to run a VM with more than 8 Vcpu, I will think the best option of it will be running on physical servers instead of VM. Which could be consider not a good candidates to be virtualized.

Anyhow, VMware are way far ahead with the competitor as HyperV or Xen which is lack of flexibilities and reliabilities today. At this moment, VMware are still the technology and market leader in virtualization.

I’m glad I’m part of the VMware ESX4 enrolled beta user. Stay tune with the ESX4 and ESX 4i, I believed it will not disappointing most of the VMware users.