Category Archives: VMware

Vmware Update Manager Utility

VMware Update Manager – Fixing vCenter Plugin Issues

VMware, , ,

VMware Update Manager is one of the most necessary tools in your environment, it’s also built really well and can be customized to fit your environment.

However there are times that the update manager plugin within vCenter Client can break. So lets look at a hidden tool to fix most of your Update Manager woes.

For this post, I am demonstrating how to fix a faulty database connection, after windows updates broke the Update Manager Service.

The ODBC connects to the DB fine, however Update manager shows the following in the plugin manager and when you try to enable it.

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So here the issue is pretty obvious, no connection to the database. Which we know is online.

So to get Update Manager to reconnect to the database, we can do this using;

C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\Update Manager\VMwareUpdateManagerUtility.exe

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Running this application/executable displays a dialog box which allows you to change 4 settings;

  • Proxy Settings
  • Database Settings
  • Re-Register to vCenter Server
  • SSL Certificate

These options are pretty self-explanatory. For the SSL Certificate, this is where you want to replace the self signed with a company compliant certificate.

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So for me, all I had to do was re-enter the details for the database, and click apply, and you can see that it was successful. I went back into vCenter Plugin Manager and Enabled the plugin.

This main reason behind this post was to highlight the tool for you guys, its small and simple, but removes any hardships of having to reinstall the product or powershelling your way out of trouble.

 

Regards

 

Dean


01 esx4 install e1416438261523

Back to the Future – Configure ESX 4.0 iSCSI Multipathing

Networking, VMware, , , , , , , ,

So I’m in the middle of an upgrade of environment that has;

  • 2 x Hosts on ESX 4.0
  • SAN using SAS connections to Hosts
  • No resources available for failover and testing
  • Limited network ports

I’m installing;

  • 3 x Hosts on ESXi 5.5
  • Nimble SAN – iSCSI

So to move all the virtual machines from the SAS SAN to the Nimble, I need to move the VM’s whilst turned on,

I’ve setup the iSCSI networking on the ESX host,

  • Creating VMKernal ports with IP addresses,
  • Mapping a VMNIC to each VMKernel directly
  • Setting MTU size to 9000

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Continue reading Back to the Future – Configure ESX 4.0 iSCSI Multipathing →

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Veeam ONE v8 – New Look, New Features

General, VMware, , , , , , , , ,

So I covered Veeam Backup and Replication v8 here. And now for the Veeam ONE Edition of the v8 update post.

The Update Process

Pretty simple, mount the ISO, follow the instructions for Veeam One install, which will detect and upgrade the existing environment.

New Look, New Features

So you will see that straight away a new set of swish icons, sporting the new blue look.

2014-11-07_13-28-26 Continue reading Veeam ONE v8 – New Look, New Features →

hp ilo chip

Setting iLO IP Address via ESXi CLI

HP, VMware, , ,

HP iLO is a great tool to have, remote console access, unfortunately it is sometimes forgotten by engineers and technicians to be configured. Which is a pain when you then need remote access to the ESXi.

So here is how to configure the HP iLO IP address using the ESXCLI via SSH.

  1. Turn on your SSH for the host
  • Configuration
  • Security Profile
  • SSH
  • Start

2014-11-11_23-36-26 Continue reading Setting iLO IP Address via ESXi CLI →

vmwarevss

Using PowerCLI to create Virtual Machine Port Groups

Networking, VMware, , , ,

So basically I had a host failure where all of the configure was lost, if I was more savvy with Powershell/PowerCLI, I would have been able to rebuild it all via scripts, but that clones the settings from a working host.

But nevermind that is for a different day of learning.

So I configured the host to the point of Networking, so the vSwitches had the correct NICs, but I needed to do all the port groups, which in the GUI if you have a few to do is time consuming.

So in PowereCLI, pull all of your information, port-group names and VLAN IDs.

Get-Vmhost -name <FQDN of host> | Get-VirtualSwitch -name  | Get-VirtualPortGroup

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To create a port-group

Get-Vmhost -name <FQDN of host> | Get-VirtualSwitch -Name  | New-VirtualPortgroup -Name "Name of PG" -VlanID
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Obviously this is a very short crude method of achieving what I need, but here you can see the basic building blocks needed to create Port Group in PowerCLI.
Regards

Dean