Posts tagged "vmware-2"

231 posts

New Broadcom bnx2x drivers released for ESX but beware, not all are supported with HP Flex-10

Apr 1, 2011

VMware has released some new Broadcom bnx2x Nic Drivers which are used in HP blades for the HP NC532 Nics. As with most bnx2x network card driver updates and HP Flex-10 there's good news, bad news and unfortunately also the usual confusing news. Let's clear up the confusing news first. There have been two new drivers released: VMWare's Compatibility Guides show which drivers are supported with...

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Investigating the health of a vCenter database server

Mar 9, 2011

VMware has released a new ( all about investigting the health of a vCenter database. I've blogged before on the major issue with vCenter being a massive ( "Why vCenter is letting VMware’s side down") and also on some steps to work out ( "Determining where growth is occurring in the vCenter Server database") in the database which is now included in this article. This new KB article does provide...

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Installing HP Agents on ESX with PowerCLI and Putty/Plink

Mar 7, 2011

Anyone who needs to build multiple ESX(i) hosts naturally looks to scripting to automate the process. Scripting allows for faster deployment once you have developed the script but equally important reduces human error. It's far to easy to mistype a port group name, vlan number or IP address. Scripting removes this element of humen error and allows you to build ESX(i) hosts preditably and quickl...

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HP Flex-10, ESX and Broadcom fun still continuing with ESX 4.1 Update 1…

Feb 24, 2011

ESX 4.1 update 1 was released recently which started the investigation again into the Broadcom bnx2x driver versions which are important in HP Blade installations. Here's a timeline of what drivers have been released: So, there are two Update Manager driver updates with the same version number: _1.54.1.v41.1-2_. The 29/11/2010 version with Vendor Assigned ID: ESX410-201011401-BG has this associ...

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Scripting Flex-10 ESX design with PowerCLI

Feb 18, 2011

My ( posts detail the configuration steps required to deploy ESX with Flex-10. There's a lot of clicking around in the vSphere client that can be automated with PowerCLI. The steps below will set up the ESX networking component as described in the design posts so can be incorporated into the rest of your PowerCLI build process. The information text and colours are optional but it does make it e...

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Flex-10 ESX design with simplicity and scalability: Part 1

Feb 17, 2011

I've written quite a few ( about HP Flex-10 and some of the challenges and solutions to getting everything up and running. I've also discussed my ideas about Flex-10 ESX design on the ( podcast so here it is... If you are deploying Flex-10 make sure you have all the prerequisites in place: ( I also recently managed to find the manual page for the HP Virtual Connect Flex-10 10Gb Ethernet Module...

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Flex-10 ESX design with simplicity and scalability: Part 2

Feb 17, 2011

This post continues from ( where the Flex-10 configuration was done. So now we have all the Flex-10 networking configured, its time to see how this works in ESX. All VLANs are now being passed down all the uplinks, through the Flex-10 switches and onto the _vm\_trunk\_1a_ and _vm\_trunk\_2a_ Ethernet Networks. What we need to do now is install ESX or ESXi and get them connected to the networks....

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Determining where growth is occurring in the vCenter Server database

Feb 4, 2011

VMware has released a useful ( to help you work out where your vCenter database growth may be coming from. ( As the vCenter database is the only place for storing all config information, performance data, tasks, events etc. it can grow very quickly especially if you are doing large scale deployments. The article may point you in the right direction and highlight if you are gathering too much in...

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Getting Nic firmware versions with PowerCLI

Jan 27, 2011

Sometimes you need to delve into the innards of ESX to get information out that just isn't available through the VMware SDK and so not directly available to PowerCLI. If you've been doing any work recently with HP Flex-10 and its firmware requirements, you may need to find out the network card firmware version which is only available from within the ESX console by typing ethtool -i vmnic0 So, P...

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I've been served on vSoup!

Jan 25, 2011

I was honoured to be invited as the first guest on ( joining ( (( Ed Czerwin (( and ( (( talking about virtualisation We spoke about managing virtual desktops, VDI, HP Flex-10 switches and firmware issues, storage and plently of other things! You can download the podcast from ( or even better subscribe through (

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