Storage fundamentals

Throughput part 1: The Basics
http://www.vmdamentals.com/?p=266

Throughput part 2: RAID types and segment sizes
http://www.vmdamentals.com/?p=296

RAID 10 or RAID 5

This is a common question in every storage consultation. Right answers for such questions is - It depends. Lot of people don't like RAID 5 and they have good reasons ... Look at BAARF (http://www.baarf.com/) initiative Battle Agains Any RAID Five, Four, F(T)hree. Very nice RAID5 versus RAID10 comparison is at http://www.miracleas.com/BAARF/RAID5_versus_RAID10.txt

I think that good choice depends on required performance, capacity, and data value stored on protected disks. RAID is just one type of protection and other protections should be used. Other data protections are:

• Backup
• Local Disk Replication (Volume Clones - Business Continous Volumes like i.e. EMC SnapView)
• Remote Disk Replications (EMC SAN Copy, EMC SRDF, IBM Metro Mirror, etc.)

So sometimes RAID 5 or 6 makes sense.

Mepis Linux

LiveCD, System Recovery CD, Linux USB Boot Key
https://www.mepis.org/

UPS, Motorgenerators, A/C, ...

http://www.elteco-ups.cz/

Turning an opensolaris host into a fibre channel storage array

http://prefetch.net/blog/index.php/2009/05/11/turning-an-opensolaris-host-into-a-fibre-channel-storage-array/

HowTo: Create sar Graphs With kSar [ Identifying Linux Bottlenecks ]

http://www.cyberciti.biz/tips/identifying-linux-bottlenecks-sar-graphs-with-ksar.html

Excelent blog about virtualization, VMware, EMC, ...

http://virtualgeek.typepad.com/

VCP 4 Certification

I have passed VMWARE VCP 4 Exam on 30-Nov-2009.

EMC Celerra - Virtual Appliance

Good for test lab environment ...
http://virtualgeek.typepad.com/virtual_geek/2009/04/new-celerra-vsa.html

Failover with ISC DHCP

http://www.madboa.com/geek/dhcp-failover/

CPU Benchmark

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/

Physical to Virtual Conversion of Linux Servers with VMware Converter BootCD

http://www.petri.co.il/physical-to-virtual-conversion-of-linux-servers-with-vmware-converter-bootcd.htm

IP relé + teploměr

http://www.papouch.com/shop/scripts/_detail.asp?katcislo=0236

Good film about how to install PowerPath/VE

Got an excellent film about how to install PowerPath on ESX or ESXi from friends at EMC and thought it would be good to share…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDC0EQ-jM_I

VMware vSphere Firewall diagram

http://www.vreference.com/2009/09/22/firewall-diagram-updated-to-version-3/

Platespin Recon - cannot get performance counters?

Check permissions on target system:
Regedt32/hklm/currentcontrolset/control/securepipeserver/winreg. -system has full control

Hardware connectors, slots, sockets, ...

http://www.technibble.com/articlecontent/2009/07/computer-hardware-chart1.jpg

VMware Converter - P2V

Your conversion speed will vary depending on options you select during the conversion process.

VMware converter uses two types of “cloning” methods during the P2V process:

File level cloning : Performed when you make the volume smaller then original (slowest conversion speed)

Block level cloning : Performed when you maintain or make drives larger (fastest conversion speed)


If you need to see the conversion rate use the VMware Standalone. It will now report the conversion rate as well as conversion type it is using to get your data into the virtual environment.

On my last project conversion speed varied from 144GB/Hr (or 2.4GB/min block lvl copy) to 36GB/Hr (.6GB/min file lvl copy).

Installing dell openmanage 6.1 on esxi 4.0

This introduction was originally published at http://communities.vmware.com/thread/220783;jsessionid=BDA548B9B81DA124C2F62A75BC7775C6?start=30&tstart=0

...

Here are the exact steps for installing dell openmanage on ESXi 4.0. This is provided in their support site.

1) Download the appropriate RCLI (Remote Command Line Interface) package from http://www.vmware.com/http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/vcli/ depending on whether your system is running on Microsoft Windows or Linux.
2) Copy the Dell OpenManage bundle to a directory on your system.
3) Use the vihostupdate command. If you are using Microsoft Windows, navigate to the folder where you have installed the RCLI utilities to use this command. If you are using Linux, this command is installed when you install the RCLI RPM .
4) Execute the command vihostupdate --server -i -b
5) The command output displays a successful or a failed update.

You must enable CIM OEM providers on the VMware ESXi 4 system after installing the Dell OpenManage bundle to manage a system with Dell OpenManage Server Administrator.

Using vSphere Client to Enable CIM OEM Providers:
To enable CIM OEM providers using VMware vSphere Client, you need to have the vSphere Client tool installed. You can download and install the tool from https:// where is the IP address of the VMware ESXi 4 system.

To enable CIM OEM providers on the VMware ESXi 4 system using vSphere Client:
1) Log on to the VMware ESXi 4 system in which vSphere Client is installed.
2) Click the Configuration tab.
3) Under the Software section on the left side, click Advanced Settings.
4) In the Advanced Settings dialog box, click “UserVars” on the left pane.
5) Change the value of the “CIMOEMProvidersEnabled” field to 1.
6) Click OK.
7) Restart your system for the change to take effect. Use the Summary tab in vSphere Client to restart the system.

BIND 9 Configure Views To Partition External and Internal DNS Information

http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-unix-bind9-named-configure-views/