After reading through the ESX 4.0 and vCenter 4.0 Server Installation Guide I noticed the following requirement for adding vCenter to a Linked Mode group;
“All vCenter Server instances must have network time synchronization. The vCenter Server installer
validates that the machine clocks are not more than 5 minutes apart.”
Now this got me thinking…..
If a company had two Data Centers, lets say one in London and one in Amsterdam, They’ve decided they wanted to use vCenter Linked Mode to help them manage both Data Centers from a central location. According to VMware’s documentation this wouldn’t be possible due to the time difference between the two cities, London GMT and Amsterdam GMT+1 would mean that the vCenter Server clocks would be 1 hour apart.
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Whilst revising for the VCP4 Beta Exam and also replying to a thread on the VMTN Forum, I’ve come across a couple of instances where there is a lack of “using NPIV in VMware ESX 4” information. The only good post I can find is Jason Boche‘s post; N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV) and VMware Virtual Infrastructure, but his post is written and tested using ESX3.5. So I have decided to find out as much information as I can and post it here.
Definition: NPIV stands for N_Port (Node Port) ID Virtualization
What does NPIV do? NPIV is a useful Fibre Channel feature which allows a physical HBA (Host BUS Adapter) to have multiple Node Ports. Normally, a physical HBA would have only 1 N_Port ID. The use of NPIV enables you to have multiple unique N_Port ID’s per physical HBA. NPIV can be used by ESX4 to allow more Fibre Channel connections than the maximum physical allowance which is currently 8 HBA’s per Host or 16 HBA Ports per Host. See the image above for a graphical representation of NPIV.
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Tomorrow (17th July) I have the pleasure of sitting the VCP4 vSphere 4 Beta Exam, all 4 hours of it..
One of the main things I remember from taking the VCP3 exam was the amount of Configuration Maximum questions that VMware ftel the need to put into it. So I downloaded the vSphere 4 Configuration Maximum PDF and began reading, reading again and reading again. But nothing seemed to stick in my memory.
I have decided to make myself 3 mini vSphere 4 Configuration Max Practice Exams, so I can test myself over and over until I have learnt them. I haven’t added all the maximums to the exams, just the ones I think might be included in the VCP4 Exam.
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This morning i received an email from VMware;
VMware is proud to announce the availability of the VMware Certified Professional on vSphere 4 (VCP4) beta exam! We would like to invite you to participate in this beta. Your experience as a current VCP3 and vSphere beta product user will be valuable in helping us craft a high quality exam.
But it has to be taken by 17th July…. So i had better get revising
Here are few details about the Exam:
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VMware has just released a joint Proof of Concept with Cisco titled VMotion between Data Centers.
Just lately I’ve been doing a lot of extra reading about how Cloud computing is shaping and evolving and I believe this to be another step taken by VMware to closer themselves on becoming a “Private Cloud” solution. Will we soon be seeing Virtual Infrastructures spanning separate Data Centers?
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I have produced this practice exam to help me learn the latest features and configuration maximums available VMware vSphere 4.
Please feel free to use it as much as you like. If you think an answer to a question is incorrect or you would like to contribute some questions to the exam please feel free to Contact Me. If you want to be notified whenever questions are added to the practice exam Follow Me on Twitter.
Please be aware that this exam is still in Beta, many questions are under review.
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Not long after installing vSphere Update Manager i decided to run a “Scan for Updates” on one of ESX3.5 Hosts. The night before i had received a VUM Download Alert email with a list of new updates which indicated to me that VUM seemed to be running as fine, but no sooner had i started the scan it Failed showing the following Error;
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I’ve come across this little issue whilst trying to make some changes to my ESX firewall.
I connected to my ESX Host using Putty and logged in using my non-privileged account (Called login) and then to run the ESXCFG commands i needed to change to my Root user.
So i entered su and put in the root password when prompted. I could see that my user account had been changed to root so i tried to run the esxcfg-firewall command.
This is what i found;
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I’m not really sure why as most of the time i run on a load of old tosh! but i now have 200 followers on Twitter.
I’d be interested to know actually how many of them are real people and how many of them are young girls trying to have webcam action with me..
If you don’t already, feel free to Follow Me.
Thanks anyway guys, i will continue to talk twaddle as you all seem to enjoy it.
My Top 5 Twitters Users for May 09 based on tweets being Useful, Interesting or Funny are…*Drum Roll*
1st – Stevie Chambers
2nd – Kiwi Si
3rd – Rob Upham
4th – Duncan Epping
5th – Cody Bunch
Well done and thank you to you guys for sharing all of your information and occasionally brightening up my day.
For further information checkout my previous post – My Top 5 Monthly Twitter Users – It could be you!
