VMWare ESXi is an installable/embeddable virtualization platform based around the ESXi Hypervisor.
18
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3answers
57k views
How to run VMWare ESX or ESXi in a virtual machine?
Can VMWare ESX or ESXi be installed and used inside a virtual machine?
It can be installed inside VMWare Workstation or Server, but then it doesn't work; the main symptoms are:
It runs REALLY ...
2
votes
1answer
1k views
Openfiler iSCSI performance
Hoping someone can point me in the right direction with some iSCSI performance issues I'm having. I'm running Openfiler 2.99 on an older ProLiant DL360 G5. Dual Xeon processor, 6GB ECC RAM, Intel ...
8
votes
5answers
4k views
Best filesystem choices for NFS storing VMware disk images
Currently we use an iSCSI SAN as storage for several VMware ESXi servers. I am investigating the use of an NFS target on a Linux server for additional virtual machines. I am also open to the idea of ...
1
vote
3answers
6k views
How to find out more hardware details using only ESXi4.1 and (possibly) shell
Running ESXi4.1 on an HP machine, with only remote access to the host ssh shell and the vmware console (no iLO), is there a way to gather a hardware report from the server?
I am specifically ...
28
votes
4answers
3k views
Are VMWare ESXi 5 patches cumulative?
This seems basic, but I'm confused about the patching strategy involved with manually updating standalone VMWare ESXi hosts. The VMWare vSphere blog attempts to explain this, but the actual process is ...
4
votes
3answers
712 views
Reboot Virtual Machine every 20 minutes
We need to be able to create a way to reboot virtual machines in the lab every 20 minutes automatically.
Is there any way this can be done in vSphere 5?
3
votes
3answers
1k views
How to resize the disk of a Fedora guest VM in VMWare ESXi
How do I resize (specifically increase) the disk size of a Fedora guest VM running under VMWare ESXi 4.1?
I have a Fedora 16 VM with an lvm2 formatted disk, and I've increased its disk size using the ...
6
votes
4answers
4k views
Move VMWare ESXi VM to new datastore - preserve thin-provisioning
I'm looking for a good solution to a VMWare ESXi environment issue where there's no vCenter available.
What's the best way to move a VM from one datastore to another on a single ESXi host, while ...
2
votes
4answers
5k views
Optimising MSSQL 2008 server inside VMWare ESXi
I normally run my MSSQL servers on dedicated servers, but we've taken on a client who is running their SQL Server inside a VMWare ESXi 4 host, and quite frankly it's running like crap.
We have ...
10
votes
2answers
451 views
VMware Distributed vSwitches (VDS) - Design, theory, *real* use cases and examples?
I'm starting to explore VMware Distributed Switches (dvSwitches or VDS) for use in existing and new installations. Assume VMware version 5.1 and newer with Enterprise Plus licensing. Prior to this, ...
5
votes
3answers
13k views
How do you passthrough native SATA drives to a guest on ESXi?
I have ESXi 4.0 running on an Intel DX58S0 Mothboardboard with an Intel Core i7 930 processor. VT-d is also enabled.
I have three drives in the system, drive 0 is used for ESXi. Drive 1 and 2 ...
5
votes
1answer
912 views
Options for managing Smart Array P400 on an ESXi 5 host
I'm about to install ESXi 5.0U2 on a RAID10 exposed by an HP Smart Array P400i. (The server is a DL580 G5.) However, I notice that the ROM-based utility lacks many of the features of the ...
2
votes
1answer
10k views
How to shutdown a virtual machine on ESXi5 over an ssh terminal session?
How can I shutdown a virtual machine when I am on the commandline of an ESXi5 host over ssh?
Sidenote:
To enable scripts on other machines to login to the ESXi without password, add the public ...
4
votes
3answers
3k views
ESXi 4.1 slow file transfer
My problem is that when I transfer files to or from 2 of my ESXi 4.1 servers using Veeam's FastSCP utility, the transfer seems to be limited to about 5 MBs when I can transfer the same file from the ...
3
votes
2answers
1k views
Monitor LSI 3ware raid controller on ESXi
This concerns a server that runs ESXi (v. 4.x or 5.x) installed on drives that are configured into a raid10 using an LSI 3ware 97050 raid controller.
I would like to know if there is a way to monitor ...
2
votes
1answer
4k views
ESXi 5 network performance is slow
We just did a fresh install of ESXi 5 on a host that was running ESX 4 before. Nothing has changed hardware wise. After the upgrade network performance is much slower. Even copying a big file from one ...
3
votes
2answers
250 views
Fiber Channel SAN hooked up to 2 ESXi Hosts
I have a PowerVault with 4 FC modules at 8gb/s. I don't want to jack the SAN into our 10/100/1000 switch because of the max 1gb/s speed.
My question is can I jack both ESXi host's FC into the SAN's ...
3
votes
2answers
2k views
Can a single Virtual Core on a VM use more then 1 physical core?
I have a server running dual quad core cpu's with hyper threading.
We have a Windows 2003 VM and it has a single core.
when using prime95 I notice that it tops out at about 2.3Ghz (each Core is 3ghz ...
2
votes
1answer
702 views
New standalone ESXi 5 deployments - USB versus SD card?
Now that the old full VMWare ESX with service console is no longer, I'm redeploying some standalone ESXi servers. I'm using HP ProLiant ML and DL G6 and G7 servers. Does it make more sense to utilize ...
1
vote
1answer
313 views
Remote RAID Control in ESXi on a Dell PowerEdge 2950 Using OpenManage
I was wondering how one can add a drive into an existing RAID array while ESXi is still running. I have read that you are able to use Dell OpenManage to do this. I have installed OMSA 7.0 on the ...
1
vote
2answers
654 views
Very strange problem with VMDK thin/thick disks
I have some ESXi (4.1) virtual machines which were initially created using thin-provisioned disks, but where then physically moved to different datastores (all of them iSCSI); since these are ...
1
vote
2answers
286 views
vmware copy production server to a test server
We are currently using Vmware infrastructure at my work where all our production servers are virtual. At the moment we are not having any good test servers and I have been thinking that it should be ...
0
votes
1answer
117 views
esxi 5 monitoring
I'm new to esxi/vmware world. Have few question about monitoring esxi host. Now I'm using trial versian esxi 5.1
I can see performance charts in vShpere client. Cool. But I want to export this raw ...
0
votes
0answers
223 views
Bridging between two networks one openVPN and another on windows 2003 server on ESXi
I have two different networks in two different offices interconnected using OpenVPN. The windows 2003 server (AD) on one network can now talk to all the machines in the main network where OPENVPN ...
15
votes
5answers
2k views
Best Practices for virtualizing servers onto the SAN?
Alright, so I want to start leveraging my SAN a little more than I have been, and at the same time, take advantage of ESXi.
Currently, I've got an array of Dell PowerEdge 1955 blades connected to a ...
19
votes
9answers
90k views
Is there a way to clone an existing VM on an ESXi server without having to re-import it?
I have imported a VM into an ESXi server using the VMware "Converter stand alone utility". However, this process is a little tedious. Since I eventually want several copies of this VM (or, to be ...
9
votes
2answers
15k views
VMWare ESXi free?
Much is made of the fact that VMWare's ESXi hypervisor is "free"
As best I can tell, you can install the hypervisor on a host for "free".
Because ESXi does not have a built in management console, ...
17
votes
5answers
3k views
Why are snapshots considered as temporary backups not real backups?
I am using VMware ESXi. In our team we use to provide snapshots for long term backup.
Then we faced issues like memory spillover and the server got hang up.
I started reading in VMware knowledgebase ...
13
votes
4answers
2k views
how to update esxi 5?
I have an ESXi 5 host (free) and vSphere Client. I would like to update to u1 but I cannot find the way to do it. Updates are ZIP files with modules in it; no installer. vSphere client doesn't have an ...
7
votes
4answers
16k views
How to backup virtual machines on a standalone ESXi host?
Standalone ESXi (4.1) host without any vCenter Server.
How to backup virtual machines as quickly and storage-friendly as possible?
I know I can access the ESXi console and use the standard Unix cp ...
4
votes
2answers
6k views
Monitor ESXi hosts with Nagios
Does anyone recommend any methods for monitoring ESXi 4.1 hosts with Nagios? I have looked into SNMP but it seems to be in a pretty sorry state. Net-SNMP does not seem to be included and there is a ...
13
votes
4answers
2k views
Hardware firewall vs VMware firewall appliance
We have a debate in our office going on whether it's necessary to get a hardware firewall or set up a virtual one on our VMWare cluster.
Our environment consists of 3 server nodes (16 cores w/ 64 GB ...
13
votes
9answers
10k views
Is it possible/advisable to run VMware Server ESX/ESXi on a laptop?
The idea of having a small footprint hypervisor as the primary OS on a laptop or desktop where every "real" OS is a guest appeals to me. Now I realize this software is more typically used on blades ...
7
votes
4answers
1k views
Monitoring Dell/HP Servers Running ESXi (Free)
What are you all doing to monitor ESXi servers that run the free edition? With the lack of SNMP support, it seems fairly limited to me. What'd I'd like to be able to do is get some type of alert when ...
4
votes
4answers
412 views
How do you monitor your HP hardware while running virtual servers?
Our organization servers are mostly not virtualized and we have been using HP System Management, System insight manager to get hardware health from the servers. This system works well and we like it.
...
4
votes
5answers
2k views
vmware server end of life, where to go now?
We have some virtual machines on vmware server 2.x running on 64 bit hardware and quite happy with it.
As vmware server will no longer be offered we are thinking to migrate to ESXi, which seems is ...
3
votes
1answer
6k views
How to route public static IP to a virtual machine on a vmware ESXi host?
I have 5 static IPs from my ISP (Comcast) and I have a physical machine with VMware ESXi 4.0 on it that is hosting multiple virtual machines. Right now I am just using the default vmware virtual ...
3
votes
2answers
3k views
SSD on Vmware ESXI 4 (TRIM? Good Idea?)
I just posted about finding bottle necks and have narrowed it down to having way too many VMs on my machine on one 15K SAS drive. I have plenty of cores and plenty of ram.
So I am planning on putting ...
2
votes
6answers
8k views
Fastest way to move files from a guest VM to the host?
I'm looking for the fastest way to copy files from a VM to physical servers.
Setting up a network between them isn't a thing I'd like to do. I believe it is much more secure when not having one.
...
2
votes
4answers
2k views
What configuration changes can I make to speed up extremely slow Windows VM's in ESXi 4.0
I've recently moved from VMWare Server to ESXi 4.0. Running on Dell T310. My VM's have been restored but they are running dog slow compared to VMWare Server. I loaded ESXi 4.0 using only default ...
6
votes
4answers
8k views
Monitoring hardware RAID on VMWare ESXi
I've got an ESXi 3.5 server on "unsupported" hardware - SuperMicro motherboard, Adaptec 9410 3405 RAID controller (oops, the 9410 is the onboard controller that's not being used for RAID) - and I'm ...
4
votes
2answers
243 views
Migrate VM from Virtual to Physical Server
I’m after viewpoints on my situation from my fellow sysadmins. I think I have thought of the points, but want someone else’s opinion.
I have an ESXi5 Cluster consisting of 5 Physical machines: 4 in ...
3
votes
3answers
1k views
How do I upgrade an ESXi installation with the Dell Customized ISO?
We have a Dell Poweredge server running ESXi 4.1 U1 that was installed using Dell's customized ESXi ISO. Now we would like to upgrade to 4.1 U2 and upgrade any Dell specific bits that were installed.
...
3
votes
4answers
11k views
Disk IO slow on ESXi, even slower on a VM (freeNAS + iSCSI)
I have a server with ESXi 5 and iSCSI attached network storage. The storage server has 4x1Tb SATA II disks in Raid-Z on freenas 8.0.4. Those two machines are connected to each other with Gigabit ...
3
votes
1answer
2k views
How is the /altbootbank/ partition used in ESXi?
I'm aware that ESXi maintains two copies of its boot partition, /bootbank and /altbootbank, and that /altbootbank is more or less a backup copy of /bootbank, which is the running copy.
What I'm not ...
3
votes
3answers
6k views
Create a Guest Virtual Machine from command line in VMWare ESXi/vSphere 4?
Finding I have access to a Windows machine less and less these days and am a bit frustrated by the lack of a Virtual Infrastructure Client for Mac or Linux. I have SSH setup on my ESXi hosts and have ...
2
votes
2answers
189 views
How can I automatically create/control VMs using vsphere?
Is it possible to automatically create virtual machines using vSphere / ESXi? How would I go about doing that?
I have a script to automatically create + install windows on a VM using VirtualBox. It ...
1
vote
2answers
2k views
VMWare Esxi Looking for Bottlenecks
I have a VMWare ESxi box, 22GB ram, Dual Quad Core Xeon, 2 Sas drives + Write caching raid controller etc.
Anyways, have about 30 small XP VM's running on it and starting to get some very slow boot ...
1
vote
2answers
1k views
Question about VMWare thin provisioning
I'm playing around with virtual disks and thin provisioning and have a question about it.
I've created several disks and allocated space to with thin provisioning. Is it possible to allocate more ...
0
votes
2answers
356 views
Debian Etch and ESXi slow network speeds
I have 2 etch virtual machines. One's a clean Etch r9, the other is one of our server builds.
On EtchR9 network speeds are 1Gbps. But on our server build we are only getting a max of 100Mbps, both ...
