Root password

How to recover the root password on an ESX 3.x/4.x host in single user mode

Reboot the host.
At the ESX boot menu, highlight the Service Console Only mode and press the 'a' key.
Type a space followed by the world 'single' and hit enter.
At the bash prompt, type the command 'passwd' to reset the root password.

ESXi: http://bit.ly/bOypUT

More details plus ESX 2 root password recovery procedure here: http://bit.ly/b6IkEa
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New in VMware vSphere 4.1

What's New in VMware vSphere 4.1

Lockdown Mode Enhancements - Lockdown mode allows restricted access to the ESXi Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) & Tech Support Mode (TSM). When lockdown mode is enabled, DCUI access is restricted to the root user & TSM is disabled for all users. Access to the host for management or monitoring using CIM is possible only through vCenter. Host access using vSphere Client is disabled.
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New in VMware vSphere 4.1

What's New in VMware vSphere 4.1

vCenter Orchestrator 64-bit Support - vCenter Orchestrator 4.1 provides a client and server for 64-bit installations, with an optional 32-bit client. The performance of the Orchestrator server on 64-bit installations is greatly enhanced, as compared to running the server on a 32-bit machine.

http://vmware.com/pdf/vco_410_install_config_guide.pdf
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VMware

VMware virtually presents the Intel 440BX motherboard to virtual machines. This motherboard/chipset combination is well known for broad OS compatibility which ultimately lends itself well to maximized consolidation ratios in the virtualized datacenter.

http://bit.ly/aU6zIw
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New in VMware vSphere 4.1

What's New in VMware vSphere 4.1

Improved Handling of Recalled Patches in vCenter Update Manager - VUM 4.1 immediately sends critical notifications about recalled ESX & related patches. In addition, VUM prevents installation of a recalled patch that you might have already downloaded. This also helps you identify hosts where recalled patches might already be installed.

http://vmware.com/pdf/vsp_vum_41_admin_guide.pdf
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Nested Hypervisors

Nested Hypervisors
This is not a supported configuration, however, with the right tweaks you can install ESX4 on ESX4 or ESX4 on ESX3.5.
Take a look at http://www.vcritical.com/2009/05/vmware-esx-4-can-even-virtualize-itself/
Be sure to read through the comments as well as they contain some vital information.

VMware Workstation 7 also supports ESX(i) as a guest OS.
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Update Manager patches

To change the download location for Update Manager patches:
Open C:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\Update Manager\vci-integrity.xml.
Search for [patchStore] XML tags. You'll see something similar to:
[patchStore]C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\VMware\VMware Update Manager\Data\[/patchStore]
Replace the path with the preferred path.
Save, close the file, and reboot.
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1004152
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LDAP connections

In some situations, the display name of a VM may not match the folder where its files live. This can make life difficult when trying to identify a VM by its folder name. Dominic Rivera wrote a nice script that identifies these instances for which you can proactively correct using Storage vMotion. Follow the link below and check it out:

http://vmprofessional.com/2009/06/displayname-name-on-disk.html
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Native partitions

Native partitions can not be manually created or sized during an ESXi installation. The short ESXi installation routine consumes approximately 908MB of disk spanning seven partitions (3 Primary, 4 Extended) which are automatically created based on VMware best practices. The remaining disk space is allocated as block unaligned VMFS for use with virtual machines and VMkernel swap.
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VMDK header/descriptor

Recreating a corrupt or missing VMDK header/descriptor on hosted products

The inability to read a virtual disk is catastrophic. VMware KB 1015634 details the process required to recreate a VMDK header/descriptor file which was corrupted, deleted, or somehow damaged. The header/descriptor file is required to read the .VMDK file for which it was created.

http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1015634
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ESX Firewall Rule

Make an ESX Firewall Rule Manageable in the vSphere Client

Open the file /etc/vmware/firewall/services.xml
Scroll to the bottom & note the last Service ID #
Copy an existing service section as a template (ie. faultTolerance)
Paste as new following proper XML formatting
Increment the Service ID # by 1 ensuring it's unique
Customize to fit your new inbound/outbound port rule
Save & exit
Services do not need to be restarted
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VMware Update Manager

VMware Update Manager Network Port Requirements
80
443
902
8084 TCP
9084 TCP
Optional 9000-9100 if 80 and 443 are already in use by another application

http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1004543
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1012382
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VMware ESX Purple Screen Of Death

Mike Laverick of RTFM Education and now TechTarget fame, has put together an honorable collection of VMware ESX Purple Screen Of Death image captures. Take a look and be thankful you're not looking at a representation of your own environment!

http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/vmware-content/psod/
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Windows Server 2008 R2

Support for Windows Server 2008 R2 (64-bit only remember) as a platform for vCenter Server (and VUM) was added with the release of vSphere 4.1.
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Virtual Infrastructure 3

On this day in 2006, VMware released Virtual Infrastructure 3 which included ESX 3.0 and VirtualCenter 2.0. Key features included NAS and iSCSI shared storage support, clusters, DRS, HA, Resource Pools, VCB, and a FlexLM centralized license server.
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Cost Per Application Calculator

VMware offers an online Cost Per Application Calculator. The tool was designed to accurately estimate and compare acquisition cost of a virtualization solution. VMware has labeled this metric Cost Per Application.

Take the tool for a spin and see how much you can save with VMware:
http://www.vmware.com/technology/whyvmware/calculator/
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Configuration Maximums Comparison

Configuration Maximums Comparison

Logical processors per host:
ESX(i) 4.1: 128 logical CPUs per host
ESX(i) 4.0u1: 64 logical processors per host
ESX(i) 3.5 Update 5: 32 cores per host
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vCenter Memory Statistics

Often Misinterpreted vCenter Memory Statistics:

Usage = Percentage of memory used as a percent of all available machine memory
Granted = Memory granted to the VM by the host. Memory is not granted until it is touched one time
Active = Memory used by the VM in the past small window of time
Consumed = Absolute host memory consumed by the VM
Shared = Memory shared with other VMs as a result of Transparent Page Sharing
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MS SQL

MS SQL
Simple Recovery Model: Regular backups of the trans log are not required as they do not grow much. Downside: If there is a failure of the DB, all changes made after the last full backup are lost; no SQL mirroring.

If recovery from failure is critical, Full Recovery Model must be used. Ensure regular backups of database & trans logs. This allows for recovery of data up to point of failure.

http://bit.ly/9wBx35
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Configuration Maximums Comparison

Configuration Maximums Comparison

Virtual Machines manageable by a vCenter Server:
vCenter Server 4.1: 10,000 powered on VMs
vCenter Server 4.1: 15,000 registered VMs
vCenter Server 4.0u1 32-bit: 2,000 powered on VMs
vCenter Server 4.0u1 32-bit: 3,000 registered VMs
vCenter Server 4.0u1 64-bit: 3,000 powered on VMs
vCenter Server 4.0u1 64-bit: 4,500 registered VMs
vCenter Server 2.5u6: 2,000 VMs
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Citrix Presentation Server

Starting with ESX3, virtualized Citrix Presentation Server (XenApp) workloads with a reasonable amount of users became a reality. I've virtualized many Citrix servers in production with great success. The content based page sharing mechanism really shines here. Following is a great 'Citrix on VMware' best practices article from Sven Huisman:

http://virtualfuture.info/2008/10/more-xenapp-45-on-vmware-recommendations/
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Running out of datastore disk space

DRS Affinity and Anti-Affinity rules are automated mechanisms to keep VMs on separate clustered hosts or to keep them together on the same host. This is a great unsung technology with one caveat: Only 2 VMs may be included per rule. In other words, if you need a rule for 3 VMs, create multiple rules which grow exponentially as VMs are added. This caveat was resolved in vSphere 4.1; rules can be created with many VMs.
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Enable daemons/services

Where possible, beware a potential pitfall of adding virtual hardware after vNICs have been added and configured in the guest OS. Adding virtual hardware (ie. a storage controller) sometimes changes the properties of the vNICs such that the guest OS will see it as a new NIC with and will assign a DHCP configuration.
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New in VMware vSphere 4.1

What's New in VMware vSphere 4.1

Power Management Improvements - ESX 4.1 takes advantage of deep sleep states to further reduce power consumption during idle periods, configured by the vSphere Client UI. In addition, you can view the history of host power consumption & power cap information on the vSphere Client Performance tab on newer platforms with integrated power meters.

http://bit.ly/9q9HW8
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Check your ESX host

vmware-umds.exe is a VMware Update Manager command line utility that doesn't receive much attention. Nonetheless, it's installed on the VUM server and may come in handy for you some day. A few of its uses are invoking the download of updates as well as exporting updates to an archive folder.

Another command line utility is vmware-updateDownloadCli.exe which can be used to import updates from an archive folder.
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Looking for VMware Tools?

Looking for VMware Tools? Look no further than your ESX host under /vmimages/tools-isoimages. There you’ll find the .iso files that mount as images into the virtual CD-ROM tray when the “Install/Upgrade VMware Tools” command is passed to the ESX host for a VM. Under the floppies folder you’ll find vmscsi.flp which is the optimized BusLogic SCSI driver for legacy Windows guests.
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Clearing The Air On Shares

Clearing The Air On Shares

Share values are a method of allocating CPU and memory resources to VMs with preference in an over commit situation. Shares can be assigned individually in the VM configuration, or more globally at the resource pool level. What's often forgotten is that shares only come into play when a shortage of CPU or memory actually occurs. Outside of resource contention, shares don't do a darned thing.
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Fusion 1.0

On this date in 2007, VMware released Fusion 1.0, a VMware Workstation like product for the Apple Mac. Fusion was the first VMware product to introduce Unity view - a technology which takes the guest VM start menu and application windows and presents them as a seamless window on the Mac as if it was running PC applications.
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