VM /ETC Go Green with Virtualization. Go UGLY Green with vmetc.com.

One of the most popular topics of discussion in the virtualization community has always been about installing ESX on a whitebox server. Two of the most popular posts on VM /ETC have been ESX home lab hardware shopping list and Cheap ESX solutions for testing which are both about finding and using hardware not on the VMware HCL that can run ESX. Now, with VMware announcing new relationships with ASUS, Gigabyte, Tyan, Inventec, and Supermicro, ESX 3.5 and ESXi will be certified, supported, and even ship embedded on more server platforms than ever before.

VMware provides a timeframe of availability in the official announcement linked above:

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New Patches have been released for ESX 3.5 / 3i, ESX 3.02, and ESX 3.01. Information from the email notifications I received are copied in this post. Looks like monthly patching has become a reality for VMware. That’s the ultimate proof of success, I guess. If it’s a popular product the chances of it being exploited are increased exponentially. Make sure your Update Manager server is working properly …..

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Another session I attended at VMware’s Partner Exchange last week was titled ESX Log Analysis - Tech 207. I did not realize it when I signed up, but this was essentially the same session that I previously attended at VMWorld 2007 last September. I did a quick Google search on this topic to find the VMWorld slides and noticed that Scott Lowe live blogged from San Francisco while attending this very session. Then Searching on the VMWorld.com site I found that this was also a session at VMWorld Europe 2008 titled VI3 Advanced Log Analysis. You can get a copy of the .ppt used at the VMWorld Europe 2008 session on my Files Page.

There is nothing really too new about t-shooting ESX logs here, but the following are my notes from last week. On the other hand, there are some general notes directly related to ESXi logs and using Update Manager included.

I cleaned up my notes a little, but the following is still a raw outline. use These notes and the .ppt mentioned above to hopefully help educate yourself on this topic.

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I was researching Dell’s latest announcement, Dell Unveils Virtualization Blockbuster – From Servers and Storage to Software and Services and trying to find definitive proof of the $99 price for embedded ESXi or the $299 price for embedded Citrix XenServer Express as reported by virtualization.info. Although I did not find the pricing in the announcement, I was able to find it by going through the process of using the Dell Online Store to build a R805 server. By clicking the green “customize it” button I was eventually able to see the Optional Virtualization Offerings section with the pricing for the embedded hypervisors. See the screenshot to the right. (click for larger view)What surprised me during this process was the “Help me Choose” link in this section. Clicking that link took me to a Help Me Choose: Hypervisor page from Dell that is basically accurate and helpful for comparing high level features of ESX 3.5, ESXi, Citrix XenServer and Microsoft Hyper-V.

Here is a screenshot of the comparison table from Dell’s page.

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The VMware Guest Operating System Installation Guide is downloadable as a .pdf or available online. The document’s “About this Book” section summarizes it’s purpose as follows:

“This manual, the Guest Operating System Installation Guide, provides users of VMware® ESX Server, VMware® GSX Server, VMware® Server, VMware® ACE, VMware® Workstation, and VMware Fusion^TM information about choosing and installing guest operating systems for VMware virtual machines.”

There are sections of installation instructions for every past and present operating system that is supported. What I am posting from this document is a very helpful table that is a quick reference of what VMware products support which VM operating systems. This table has been copied from the online version of the guide.

This table makes it very easy to answer questions like: 

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I Received this patch notification email from VMware on 5/2/08.

To update your subscription, please visit VMware Patch/Maintenance Alerts Subscriptions [http://support.vmware.com/selfsupport/subscription/]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Subject: ESX Server 3.5 / 3i - New Patches Available
Release Date: 04/30/08
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

New patches are available for ESX Server 3.5/3i.

Please follow the instructions on the appropriate patch download page.

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First reported by theinquirer.net in the March 14 article Dell set to absorb price of ESX3i hypervisor, it appears Dell will be offering ESX 3i for free when purchasing PowerEdge servers. Virtualization.info posted Dell to give VMware ESX Server 3i for free? the following day which was then followed by a few other blogs reacting to the news with similar posts. Although the announcement of this possibility was, and still is, exciting, the comments posted by readers and bloggers have been very insightful and interesting.

Comments from theinquirer.net’s article:

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I previously posted an email I received that provided a hardware shopping list for building cheap AMD or Intel ESX servers for home testing. There is also a few good recent discussions in the VMware Community Forums that provide more suggestions for compatible ESX hardware.

Cheap ESX Solution (Tests) discussion contains a table of motherboards and officially unsupported but working servers provided by Dave Mishchenko. Read the post for even more systems and parts to build working ESX servers.

ESX 3.5 test lab lists several desktop systems on which forum users have been successful in installing ESX.

Cheap ESX server, onboard SATA - Working !! starts off providing a parts list of a working ESX system, and then continues with tips and tricks to get ESX working.

Of course, all of the discussions as well as my previous post do not cover the cost of anything except the hardware for ESX. You also need to consider how you will build the complete VI3 environment. For example, you can run VC as a VM, and use Openfiler for your shared storage

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How do you design resource pools in an ESX Cluster? There are two strategies that are the most popular in my experience. The first strategy creates resource pools based on CPU and Memory shares for host resource conflict management, and the second strategy uses reservations and limits to guarantee physical resources and ensure VM containment. This post will use a 3 ESX host example to explain both strategies. Please feel free to comment on the pros and cons of each or why you think one is better than the other.

In the example scenario three ESX hosts each have 16 GB RAM and 2 dual core 3.0 Ghz CPUs. The three hosts will all be members of the same ESX cluster.

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One of the announcements this week from VMworld Europe was that ESX 3i will begin shipping integrated in Dell, Fujitsu Siemens, HP, and IBM industry standard servers in the next 60 days. The following is a VMware VIP Partner Bulletin email I received. Check out the links to the hardware manufacturer’s individual announcements in the body of this email.

Dear Richard,

Today, February 26, 2008 at VMworld Europe, VMware announced agreements with the world’s largest systems providers—Dell, Fujitsu Siemens Computers, HP and IBM—to embed VMware ESX Server 3i across broad lines of servers to accelerate the proliferation of virtualization across companies ranging from small business to large enterprises. These partners are expected to commence shipping their respective industry-standard servers integrated with VMware ESX Server 3i within the next 60 days.

Last year we previewed this strategy with you when we announced the latest release of VMware Infrastructure 3 and ESX 3i. Combined, Dell, Fujitsu Siemens Computers, HP and IBM accounted for

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If you attended VMWorld 2007 in San Francisco last year them you should have received a free usb stick with a bootable copy of ESX 3i on it. It was one of the best handouts at the conference in my opinion. Now you can build your own bootable usb stick from the ESX 3i full ISO download.

Hugo from VMWire added a comment to my previous post about the ESX 3i ISO download that instructions for building your own bootable ESX 3i usb stick have been recently posted by a blogger named Knorrhane over at communities.vmware.com. It turns out that Knorrhane’s post is actually a cut and paste from the original message posted by VCPaul and found in the discussion forums at VMware Communities.

The original discussion thread contains several messages about the supportability of ESX 3i and the potential security implications of using usb devices with servers.

You can get these instructions from either link above, or I have cut and pasted them here for posterity:

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As of Monday 12.31.07 Virtualization.info reports that the stand alone version of ESX 3i is now available for download.

Ten days after the much awaited launch of VI3.5 (aka ESX Server 3.5 and VirtualCenter 2.5), VMware is ready to release the special version of ESX Server called 3i.

ESX Server 3i completely drops the so called Console Operating System (COS), based on a customized Red Hat Enterprise Linux distro, and appears as a lightweight 32MB liveCD (no need for hard disk installation).

The new architecture is offered today as a parallel version, but VMware clarified in several occasions that this is the future of ESX Server.

The product was originally planned for OEM distribution only, pre-installed inside Solid State Drives (SSD) by Dell, IBM, HP and others popular vendors, but VMware is now offering it as stand-alone download.

Unfortunately the only two servers which are supported in this first release (build 67921) are Dell 2950 and HP DL380 G5 (experimental support).

The amount of features included in stand-alone ESX Server 3i is limited (just the vSMP and the VMFS support, you’ll need VirtualCenter bundles to get more) but the starting price is very interesting: $459 (without support). Any VirtualCenter 2.5 is able to support and manage it.

Download it here.

I followed the link for download and discovered it is a >200 mb .iso file?! I’m not sure why at this point but will follow up later with what’s on this CD.

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