Just Passed the VCP550D

I took the VMWare VCP550D delta exam to day since my VCP5 was going to expire in March 15th 2015. The test cost $120 and is 65 questions long with a 75 minute time limit. their isnt a lot of time and as a matter of fact I failed the test the first tie due ti running out of time. this time I passed with a score of 500.

I used the following resources to pass this test:

• The VMware mylearn website 
• The exam blueprints
• This Whats New video

All the documentation needed is in the blueprint. Some of the questions I had to think on consisted of vSphere Editions, vCOPs (badges and what elements make them up) and Distributed Switches. the wording on those questions seems like it's meant to throw you off, read them slowly. there are also questions for  vSAN, VDP, and Replication, along with the standard VCP questions.

If you qualify for the test take it soon before time runs out.

2015 vExpert!

Well it finally happened I was granted the honorary title of vExpert. this has motivated me to kick up the blogging. Look forward to more post from me in the future.

I wan to cover some of the following but am also taking request.
vSphere 6
Horizon 6
Nutanix NOS 4.1
and more randomness

I really want to thank the VMWare vExpert selection pannel for selecting me for 2015

 

Nutanix NOS 4 Awesomeness

This week I was able to deploy a Nutanix 1350 at a clients location for for a small VDI deployment. during the deployment which consisted of unboxing the Nutanix block, plugging the network ports, and laying down the software using Nutanix's foundation software; I noticed now much simpler everything has gotten. it only took about 6 hours from start to finish tho deploy the Nutanix and copy an Windows server VM over for vCenter. Try doing that with 3 servers and a SAN.

The Nutanix ships with KVM out of the box but supports Hyper-v, ESX, and KVM. One of the first things I noticed with NOS 4 was the increased performance when moving files around on the data-store, cloning a 40GB VM took under 1 minute from hitting the go button to the new clone flashing to the vmware start screen in the console. keep in mind the the 1000 series is the at the bottom of the product line in regards to specs. Performance improvements have been added to NOS 4.0, increasing overall system performance in 20% compared to NOS 3.5.

some of the NOS 4 changes are:

Hybrid On-Disk De-Duplication
De-duplication allows the sharing of guest VM data on premium storage tiers (RAM and Flash).

Shadow Clones (Official Support)
Shadow Clones is finally out of tech-preview. Shadow Clones intelligently analyze the I/O access pattern at the storage layer to identify files shared in read only mode (ie: Linked Clone Replica).
 
Tunable Fault Tolerance (RF-3)

Smart Pathing (CVM/AutoPathing 2.0)
The new and improved CVM AutoPathing 2.0 prevents performance loss during rolling upgrades minimizing I/O timeout by pre-emptively redirecting NFS traffic to other CVMs. Failover traffic is automatically load-balanced with the rest of the cluster based on node load.

Availability Domains (Failure Domain Awareness)
Also known as ‘Block Fault Tolerance’ or ‘Rack-able Unit Fault Tolerance’ the availability domain feature adds the concept of block awareness to Nutanix cluster deployments.

Snapshot Browser
The new snapshot browser functionality allow administrator to see and restore point-in-time array-based snapshots from a VM or a group of VMs in a local or remote protection domain.

Snapshot Scheduling via PRISM

One-Click NOS Upgrade
Nutanix one-click upgrade automatically indicates when a new NOS version is available and it will auto-download the binaries if the auto-download option is enabled. With a single-click to upgrade all nodes in a cluster Nutanix will use a highly parallel process and reboot one CVM at a time using a rolling upgrade mechanism. The entire cluster upgrade can be fully monitored by the administrator.

Cluster Health
Nutanix Cluster Health is a great asset in maintaining availability for Tier 1 workloads. Cluster Health gives the ability to monitor and visually see the overall health of cluster nodes, VMs and disks from a variety of different views. With the ability to set availability requirements at the workload level, Cluster Health will visually dissect what’s important and give you guidance on how to take corrective action.
(click on the image to enlarge)

Prism Central (Multi-Cluster UI)
Nutanix now provides a single UI to monitor multiple clusters in the same or different datacenters. Prism Central avoid administrations from having to sign individually to every cluster and provide aggregated cluster health, alerts and historical data.

PowerShell Support and Automation Kit
One of the big new things for workflow automation in Nutanix NOS 4.0 are the addition of PowerShell cmdlets to interact with the Nutanix API’s.

Sources:
http://myvirtualcloud.net/?p=6218
http://nutanix.com

NFS Disconnects bug vSphere 5.5 U1

Intermittent NFS APDs on ESXi 5.5 U1 

It looks like there is a bug in ESXi 5.5 U1 with disconnecting NFS datastores. Here is a summary of the issue:



When running ESXi 5.5 Update 1, the ESXi host frequently loses connectivity to NFS storage and APDs to NFS volumes are observed. You experience these symptoms:

• Intermittent APDs for NFS datastores are reported, with consequent potential blue screen errors for Windows virtual machine guests and read-only filesystems in Linux virtual machines
• Note: NFS volumes include VSA datastores.
• For the duration of the APD condition and after, the array still responds to ping and netcat tests are also successful, and there is no evidence to indicate a physical network or a NFS storage array issue.
• The NFS storage array logs and traces also do not indicate any evident issue, other hosts not running ESXi 5.5 U1 continue to work and can read and write to the NFS share without issue.

Looks Like it affects all NFS appliance and SAN makes and models 

Upgrading to vSphere 5.5

Here is some good info on the prereqs, order, and steps on how to upgrade to vSphere 5.5. the most important thing to do is to read the release notes before the upgrade and also verify that the gear you are using is on the HCL here is the link for the release notes

After giving it a go in the lab and running into a few issues where the install would roll back (SEE HERE) I decided to also give the fresh install a try. The new install went without a hitch

Everything you need to know

Upgrade
Methods of upgrading vCenter 5.5

Fresh install
Install best practices
Methods for installing vCenter 5.5
Installing vCenter server 5.5 BP

This is the upgrade order directly from vmware. you can find the full article here.

This table describes the sequence in which the vSphere 5.5 and its compatible VMware products must be updated:

Supported Update Sequence

	VCD	VCNS	View Composer	View Connection Server	vCenter Server	VR / SRM	vCOPS	VDP	VSA	ESXi	VMware Tools	vShield Edge	vShield App	vShield Endpoint	View Agent/ Client
Update Sequence Number	1
		2
			3
				4
					5*
						6	6	6	6
										7*
											8
												9	9	9	9

* If using a Cisco Nexus 1000V, see vSphere 5.5 and its compatible third-party products in the Additional Information section of this article before upgrading the vCenter Server (sequence step 5) or the ESXi hosts (sequence step 7).

Note: If you need to update multiple products in your environment, start with updating the product with the lowest sequence number. After you update the product, update the product with the next sequence number. If a product is not present in your environment, update the subsequent product. If you need to update two products with the same sequence number, the order of update does not matter.

Before you update the vCenter Server, disable vCenter Server from vCloud Director. Also ensure that you stop or disable other VMware services so that they do not communicate with vCenter Server during the update process. For more information, see the product documentation.


You really need to verify that all the products you are using will be supported. my lab is limited and I could not check any alternate configurations other than those set aside in the upgrade and install guides.

Hello World

The first post on my new blog! Why a blog? I don't know, why not? Right? I am a " Datacenter Consultant" for a "VAR" (Value Added Reseller) and my world has completely changed in the year and a half I have been with the company. Why? Change that's why; No two environments are the same. I have seen more new and interesting things in such a short amount of time, so I figure I would share some of the issues, ideas, and what the heck, that I have run into. I also plan on letting you guys and gals in on some of the trends and new products in the VMware world.