Just another day in paradise

I know this is a bit old now (only a few days but it’s gone right through the blogosphere) but you should download it from here - http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/virtualserver/default.aspx

If you have setup a VM within SCVMM and didnt select use hardware assisted virtualization during the setup process of the VM, then there is no where in the GUI where you can set this afterwards. To overcome this you need to run some powershell and here’s the code!

$vmguest = get-vm Server001 -vmmserver SCVMMserver01
set-vm $vmguest -usehardwareassistedvirtualization

I’ve been doing a lot of SCVMM and Virtual Server “stuff” lately at my current client’s site and I’d like to share some of my findings…..

- Remember my post on the IBM physical host p2v problems with SCVMM? well it seems older versions of the IBM Server Guide CD creates and formats partitions with a disk config of 512/512 sectors per cluster. The newer versions of the Server Guide CD dont seem to call this problem they are formatted correctly 512/4096

- Seems the P2V feature is working very well for us, we’ve successfully p2v’d 7 physical servers to Virtual Server using SCVMM

- I’ve found and through consultation with Microsoft that setting NO pagefile in the VM and on the host definately stops paging (obviously) and makes the VM’s that I’ve tested perform just that little bit quicker, give it a shot! Just remember, you don’t want a VM to run out of memory so make sure your settings are correct and I’d recommend leaving 500mb unallocated to VM’s on a host to leave enough memory for the host to do whatever normal tasks it does like AV, Backup etc.

I’ve successfully proved the following works;

VM Guest - ClusterNode 1 on Host 1 - Quorum/Shared drive using iSCSI

VM Guest - ClusterNode 2 on Host 2 - Quorum/Shared drive using iSCSI

- Moved ClusterNode1 to Host 2 and brought the node back online and failed the cluster over to this node successfully

- Moved ClusterNode1 to Host 1 and brought the node back online and failed the cluster over to this node successfully

I’ve managed to successfully perform half of these tasks using powershell just need some time to work on the other half

I’ve been playing HEAPS with the BDD 2007 of late, for personal interest and I’m going to sit the exam. I’ll share quite a few things that I’ve found with you but one thing I found really handy today was how to easily capture a reference computers image to WIM.

With the BDD it will create a bootable ISO image for you to use which will allow you to image your computer with the environments that you’ve specified in the BDD. What it will also allow you to do is capture a reference computers image. To do this, follow these steps;

- Install the reference computer with Vista and any other applications and setting changes you would like to be in your base build

- Sysprep the machine and shutdown/reboot

- Boot up the machine with the ISO image for Lite Touch Deployment

- When at the initial first prompt, choose the option Exit to Command Prompt and choose Next.

- Map a network drive to your distribution share (net use s: \\servername\distribution$

- Run ImageX from S:\Distribution\tools\x86 with the following command line options: imagex /capture c: s:\wimimagename.wim “Image Capture Name”

Happy Imaging!

>> Phase 1 of the Operations Manager 2007 Security Guide is now available online

>> Windows Vista Client Monitoring Management Pack for Operations Manager 2007

>> The Technical Architecture of Exchange 2007 uncovered

>> Windows Vista Volume Activiation v2.0 Guide updated

Check out Mike Nell’s post on the Windows Server Division weblog but a snippet with the features that are pulled are as follows;

- No Live migration
- No hot-add resources (storage, networking, memory, processor)
- Support limit of 16 cores/logical processors (e.g., 2 processor, quad-core systems is 8 cores; or 4 processor, quad-core system is 16 cores)

I’m quite disappointed at the first two points. I was hoping WSV was going to be a real “ball breaker” for VMWare and give the virtualisation space a real shake up but alas, I really don’t think that is going to happen just yet…..

Doing some POC testing at a customer site and we tried to P2V 2 servers, they both come up with the following error;
“The ntfs boot volume C: has less than 8 sectors/cluster. This configuration is not supported by Virtual Server. If possible please reformat the disk with more than 8 sectors/cluster”

The 2 servers I’ve tried to P2V are;
Ibm x3650
Built with standard IBM ServerGuide CD’s and Windows 2003 then added Citrix.
Partitions - 8gb + 24gb

IBM Blade Server HS21
Build with IBM ServerGuide CD’s with Windows 2003
Partitions - 8gb + 24gb

So, how do you know whether the machine you are trying to P2v has 8 or more sectors per cluster?

- Use the ntfsinfo utility from the following link

 http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/NtfsInfo.mspx
It’s a command line utility. If your boot partition is C:, the syntax would be “ntfsinfo c:”

This will tell you the following:
Bytes per sector : 512
Bytes per cluster : 4096

sectors per cluster : 4096/512 = 8

And the word from Microsoft “In any case, we couldn’t boot up the machines with the configuration where boot disk is formatted with < 8 sectors per cluster. At this point we believe that this is a bug in VS & we are going to spend some time understanding\fixing the issue. At this point there is no workaround other than the one mentioned in the error message”
 
You also cannot P2V Windows XP with SCVMM Beta2. You’ll have to wait until RTM.

Happy P2Ving!

> WSUS v3.0 has been released

> Longhorn Server virtual labs

> Cool script for checking the updates on Windows cluster nodes by Richard MacDonald

> Discounts on Longhorn upgrade exams

> Windows Crash Dump Analysis webcast with Mark Russinovich

> System Center Essentials 2007 released for download

https://connect.microsoft.com/downloads/downloaddetails.aspx?DownloadID=6479&wa=wsignin1.0&siteid=182 - wicked!

Ever wanted to know how to disable this so you could PXE boot into WDS or RIS without pressing F12? My good buddy Dugie sent this to me, cheers mate!