ESX 3.5.x Patches for Broadcom NIC

VMware | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 23 2009

On March 20th 2009, VMware released 2 updates for the Broadcom Network Adapter Family. The 2 updates ESX350-200903412-BG - PATCH (48,6M) rated critical and ESX350-200903411-BG - PATCH (766K) rated general have the following descriptions:

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Summaries and Symptoms

This patch fixes an issue where systems using the bnx2x driver with a Broadcom NetXtreme II 57710, 57711, or 57711E NIC might experience unstable behavior whenever there is certain I/O stress or pattern. Known cases of unstable behavior include VMotion failures and memory heap issues. These behaviors are more likely to occur when using jumbo frames. The vmkernel log file shows error messages similar to the following:

Feb 17 14:52:37 esx10 vmkernel: 0:01:43:18.615 cpu6:1264)WARNING: Heap: 1397: Heap migHeap0 already at its maximumSize. Cannot expand.
Feb 20 11:00:35 viesxlabrtp02 vmkernel: 0:17:06:37.984 cpu0:1024)WARNING: Heap: 1419: Heap bnx2x (35648248/35648264): Maximum allowed growth (24) too small for size (4096)
Feb 20 11:00:35 viesxlabrtp02 vmkernel: 0:17:06:37.984 cpu0:1024)WARNING: Heap: 1522: Heap_Align(bnx2x, 2048/2048 bytes, 4 align) failed. caller: 0x8efb8e

412)

Summaries and Symptoms

This patch updates the service console kernel to support an update to the bnx2x driver to resolve a problem that affects Broadcom NetXtreme II 57710, 57711, and 57711E NICs.

*** Warning *** Don’t wash your VMworld Europe T-shirt!

VMware, VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 09 2009

After filling out the customer satisfaction papers for the overall VMworld Europe Edition, you get a nice T-shirt. At home I opened the package only to find a terrible smell, so I decided to wash it. When it came out of the machine the print on it was all damaged rendering the T-shirt unusable. So, better live with the smell when wearing it, or put it safely in your cupboard or on display :-) .

Vmworld Europe 2009 – Sessions and Labs now available

VMware, VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 09 2009

Vmworld Europe 2009 sessions and labs are now available . In order to view them you must have attended the VMworld 2009 Europe edition, or you can subscribe here for a fee to access the content.

VCDX Beta exam available

VMware | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 07 2009

As mentioned on NTPRO.NL, the VCDX Beta exam for VMware is now available. Eric, the owner of NTPRO.NL,  has already done the VMware Enterprise Administration exam and passed :-) . Good luck on  this one Eric!

Oracle to acquire Virtual Iron?

Rumors | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 06 2009

On several sites there are rumors that Oracle intends to get a bigger foothold in the virtualization market bij acquiring Virtual Iron. Oracle hasn’t commented on these rumors yet. A very interesting article can be found here.

VMworld 2009 – Call for Papers

VMworld 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 05 2009

VMware has requested for “Call for Papers” for the VMworld 2009 held in Moscone Center in San Francisco starting Augst 31st and ending September 3rd. Everyone is able to enter and run a session, if your session is admitted that is. Below you can find some dates as found on the VMworld website:

April 3rd Call for Papers closes: all submissions due by midnight PST
June 1st Notification of Acceptance
June 19th First Draft of Presentations due
July 17th Second Draft of Presentations due
August 10th FINAL Presentations due
August 31st DAY ONE of VMworld 2009

With the following content criterea:

The Content Committee will be looking for the following criteria as they review, score and make their selections:

Educate attendees; don’t pitch them — Attendees do not like being sold on your company. Be neutral and focus on the educational value of your presentation. the VMworld content committee will reject all sales pitches.

Be original — Attendees are looking for innovative ways to create a virtual environment. Share your unique perspective or story.

Present a timely topic of interest to attendees — Make sure your topic is relevant to the audience you’re targeting.

Know the technical level of your presentation — Attendees will select sessions based on their technical level. The content committee will be choosing a range of technical and business topics. Be sure to accurately designate your submission’s technical level, based on the classification choices provided in the online form.

Content Suitable for Speaker Led Sessions — As usual, the content committee is looking for content that will best represent what VMworld attendees have rated very highly in past conferences. While repeat topics with high ratings are important is it is also important for your submissions to be relevant to the state of virtualization in the industry present day. Speaker led sessions will be selected based on user ratings and relevancy.

Content Suitable for VMworld.com — A new category of acceptance this year will allow the VMworld committee to accept more sessions than usual from the plethora of highly rated content. These sessions will be showcased, like all sessions, on VMworld.com but will not be presenter-led. This will allow the committee to accept more sessions and to place these sessions directly in the hands and on the desktops of paying attendees through VMworld.com, a thriving community of thousands. VMworld.com sessions will be selected based on user rating, relevancy and will be complimentary to speaker-led sessions, giving more opportunities for great content to get into the hands and on the desktops of conference attendees.

Finally, submitting a content means you agree to meet the deadlines associated with the delivery of this content. You can admit your session here.

Vizioncore vRanger Pro 4

3rd Party Tools, VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Mar 05 2009

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While being at VMworld Europe 2009 in Cannes I visited the Solutions Exchange where I found an old familiair, Vizioncore. They caught my interest with demoing vRanger Pro version 4 which is currently in Beta.

vRanger Pro 4 is codenamed “Woodstock” and the probable releasedate will be Q2 2009. Some interesting features and changes are:

- The DOS boxes are gone! (thanks for that)
- vRanger PRO uses an internal scheduler now instead of the Windows Scheduler
- It is possible to add multiple vCenter servers
- Fast filelevel recovery (more like opening an archive)

In future releases it should be possible to “embed” vReplicator in the interface and there will be support for Microsofts Hyper-V.
Also a more granular control will be added. Unfortunately I could not figure out yet what kind of granular control ;-) but hope to find out soon.

Since the previous is all beta I am sure I don’t need to put a disclaimer here that says that current features might be subject to change.

Thursday – 3rd and final day

VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Feb 28 2009

The last day of VMworld 2009. I notice it is getting harder to get up ;-) but I managed anyways. First a coffee and something sweet to go with it. Then first session on my list DC14 – Overview of 2009 VMware Datacenter Products. Unfortunately I saw some people turning around already because of a full room. So decided to see something of “VI4″ in a LAB01 – Next Generation Datacenter Exploration.

I think this LAB was one of the busiest amongst all lab’s, but I just HAD to lay my hands on the new candy. Finally I could have a seat and after a brief explanation I wavered off the instuctor to let me be with my long awaited “VI4″ experience. Can’t remember the first part of the LAB. Wanted to make notes but I was told the LAB would be online the same very night. So far nothing there yet.

  • Thin provisioning
    It is already possible from the CLI to thin provision disks in VI 3.5. However now able to chose all kinds of formats within the GUI. Like thin/thick/thick zeroed and some more options available. Also when performing a migrate (storage vmotion), you are able to change your provisioning
  • Migrate (storage vmotion)
    Storage vmotion is now available from the GUI :-) , no need to load the 3rd party strorage vmotion plugin anymore. A demo can found here
  • vAPP
    It is possible to logically group VM’s together in a vAPP. In the settings you are able to chose startup order and startup delay. It is possible to powerup/powerdown the complete vAPP as a single entity
  • Virtual Distributed Switch (VDS)
    The Virtual Distributed Switch is a virtual switch defined on cluster level instead of on a per host based level. This makes administration much easier. Also switch vendors are able to provide their own VDS with vendor specific features like Cisco’s Nexus 1000V. A flash demo can be found here
  • Fault Tolerence (FT)
    One feature that make me all warm and fuzzy inside, FT. Upon enabling this feature it clones and powers on a standby VM. A video can say more than a thousand words and can be found here
  • Host Profiles
    With vSphere it is possible to make a configuration template from your ESX server. They are called “Host Profiles” and allow you to take a template from an ESX server, adjust it if necessary and check compliance against another ESX host. You can apply the template if you want to. A demo can be found here
  • Hot Cloning of VM’s
    It is possible to Hot Clone VM’s! I think people will love this one!
  • More ways of extending VMFS partitions

The last part of the day I spent my time in the Solutions Exchange before going back home to The Netherlands where we all landed safely.

Tuesday – 1st day addenum

VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Feb 27 2009

A small addenum for Tuesday. After visiting the solutions exchange I attended session DC31 – What’s new in the enterprise cloud. Personally I think cloud computing is a very nice concept and when listening throughout the event everyone can hear the buzz about it. Though cloud computing certainly is not a new concept it has my interest and am surely keeping track of it. At the end Tarry Singh, a well known and respected Technology Evangelist elaborated on cloud computing and the role it will take in the future.  With all the new technologies coming out it seems cloud computing is “The next logical step”.

Wednesday – 2nd day part II

VMworld Europe 2009 | Posted by Frank van Egmond
Feb 27 2009

After the Q&A I attended session DC18 – Introduction to VMware vCenter ConfigControl. vCenter ConfigControl is a product that is best described as an additional tooling to your CMDB but as said in the session, does not replace it. It inventories Virtual Machines automatically and keeps track of configuration changes and updates. This product can come quite in handy to automate an keep track of  “Virtual CI’s” and keeps de “Virtual CMDB”  and it’s relations accurate.

The last part of the day I spend at the Solutions Exchange followed up by a dinner with some peers.

At 20.00 it was time for the VMworld Afterparty. I think the decorations and the themes were awesome on “Cloud number 9″ which was the place where the party was held. A relaxed downstairs where the music was of such a level you could actually hear each other talking, following by a great band on the upper levels. Of course everything was accompanied with lots of food and drinks. The floor was moving like crazy with all the people jumping and it was just a great place to be. At midnight the party was over. Wow what a great party!

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