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I am proud to announce a new podcast I will be hosting on a weekly basis – VIRTUMANIA!

VIRTUMANIA is an Infosmack Production that will try to focus on the operational and administrative viewpoints of all things virtualization, so expect a different guest list of bloggers, architects, administrators, and consultants with each recording.

VIRTUMANIA episodes will be announced as new posts here on VM /ETC. Be sure to subscribe to the VM /ETC RSS feed in your favorite RSS reader or download the show each week from the podcast’s RSS feed. Of course, you can subscribe to the VIRTUMANIA podcast on iTunes. Finally, download or listen to each episode from the embedded player on the VM /ETC VIRTUMANIA Page.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you the first episode of VIRTUMANIA!

VIRTUMANIA Podcast Episode 1 – Virtualbox, Type 2 Hypervisors, and Security Nipples.

Rich Brambley (@rbrambley) of VMETC and Marc Farley (@3parfarley) of 3Par and StorageRap.com with guests Sean Clark (@vseanclark) of SeanClark.us and Rick Vanover (@rickvanover) of RickVanover.com. This week’s episode includes discussion about Sun Virtulabox, Teleportation, comparing all type 2 hypervisors, and Oracle’s master virtualization plan. Thanks to Greg Knieriemen (@knieriemen) of Chi Corporation for this Infosmack Production.

Listen Now:

Download

I can’t thank Greg Knieriemen and Marc Farley enough for the patience, advice, and support necessary to get this podcast off the ground. For those that don’t already know, Greg and Marc host the already widely popular Infosmack podcast covering servers, storage, and virtualization news. Tapping into their insights and experiences while planning this podcast have been, and will continue to be invaluable to me. Special thanks to Marc for the Virtumania theme music and Greg for recording and post editing each episode.

I guess I have a face for Internet radio as I was invited back as a guest for another episode of Greg Knieriemen’s (@knieriemen of Chi Corporation ) and Marc Farley’s (@3parfarley of 3Par and StorageRap.com) popular Infosmack podcast.

Along with the famous StorageIO.com’s Greg Schulz (@StorageIO – making the exact same guest lineup as my previous appearance on Episode 34), on Episode 38 we wonder about the privacy concerns surrounding Google Buzz, provide a little more coverage of VMware Partner Exchange 2010, discuss new processors from Intel and IBM and their potential use in storage devices, and, among other things, generally wonder why the great technology from IBM doesn’t make a bigger splash in the community. We also discuss Dell buying Exanet and Exar buying Neterion.

Here’s a quick list of links if you are interested in a little more information on the topics.

Episode 38 Topic Links

Google Buzz Privacy Changes

Google Buzz Recast as Auto-suggest to Quell Privacy Fears

Dell buying Exanet for rumored $12M
http://storageio.com/blog/?p=1104
Exar buying Neterion
http://www.neterion.com/how/product.html
IBM announced SONAS

IBM rolls out SONAS clustered NAS based on GPFS

IBM announced Power7:
http://storageio.com/blog/?p=1098

VMware Partner Exchange 2010 – plenty of coverage here on VMETC.com!

http://vmetc.com/tag/vmwarepex/

Download/subscribe the episode/podcast on StorageMonkeys.com. I’ve also embedded a player to listen to it right from this post if you prefer. Enjoy!

Future HP Blade Tech Day Infosmack Episode?

At the end of the month I will be at a HP Blade Tech Day Event in Houston, TX along with Greg Knieriemen.

Read the rest of this entry »

The LackRack

Most of my colleagues have a home lab with at least some equipment that is rackable, but because of expense, room size, or the decor concerns of a much smarter significant other purchasing a data center rack is not possible (or advisable). In fact, our servers, storage and switches are stacked under a desk, piled in a corner, or hidden in a coat closet. Virtualization and server consolidation has helped reduce the total amount of hardware we need running at home, but we still end up with a makeshift and cluttered workspace that keeps us in the dog house.

Now, imagine this conversation:

Yes, going to IKEA with your Love is a dangerous undertaking, but it’s a reality to consider for your home lab.

The IKEA Lack tables are the perfect size

Read the rest of this entry »

I was lucky enough to have been invited as a guest on this week’s Infosmack podcast. Infosmack, sponsored by StorageMonkeys.com, is a weekly storage, virtualization, and infrastructure podcast hosted by Greg Knieriemann and Marc Farley covering top weekly news and issues in the data center. Greg Schulz, author of the StorageIO Blog, was is also a guest with me on this week’s episode. I had a great time recording the call and I am really excited about the final result available now for download.

Already one of the subscriptions listed in my recent post about podcasts relevant to virtualization administrators, Infosmack Podcast Episode #34 – VMware vs Hyper-V discusses several topics on the minds of the virtualization community right now including:

• VMware’s purchase of Zimbra
• VMware Go for ESXi
• VMware and Microsoft Clouds
• HP’s partnership announcement with Microsoft and Hyper-V
• HP LeftHand’s announcement of a iSCSI SAN for Hyper-V
• Backup strategy for virtualized environments

Check out Episode #34 and offer your thoughts in the comments here or on the StorageMonkeys.com episode page linked above. Honestly, the title makes the podcast seem more controversial than it really is, but it’s good discussion none the less! The four of us really thought through virtual infrastructure and various vendor cloud scenarios based on recent announcements, acquisitions, and partnerships forming recently.

While you are listening Subscribe to the Infosmack Podcast for new episodes every Monday and join the StorageMonkeys.com community too. If you are an aspiring blogger use storagemonkeys.com for an instant audience. You have the option to be authenticated with your Facebook account if you don’t want to create a new one.

Be sure to look me up as rich brambley and add me as a StorageMonkey friend.

Greg Schulz has also posted is summary of the podcast. Check out his StorageIO.com post Infosmack Episode 34, VMware, Microsoft and More. Greg also includes several links for extra info on the topics we discussed.

Another 6 months have come and gone and Eric Siebert has just updated his vsphere-land.com Top 25 VMware/Virtualization Blogs. I’m proud to say that VM /ETC remains in the top 10. As of the latest voting, this blog holds the number 7 spot. In my opinion, the number of VMware and virtualization blogs seems to have sky rocketed in 2009, and every blog is an incredible, quality virtualization resource. Considering I was lazy and missed the opportunity to publish a campaign post during the recent voting period, I am truly honored to remain in the top 10. Thanks to everyone who voted for vmetc.com! I am once again inspired to “keep up the good work”.

Siebert has published a couple posts explaining the total voting results and his process of determining the ranking order. It is a lot more complex than one might think. Check out these links for more info:

• The top blog full voting results

• And the winners of the top VMware/virtualization blog are…

If you did not already know, Siebert also maintains the vLaunchpad – a web page of links to all virtualization blogs, news, and resources. Look for the vLaunchpad to be updated soon with the latest rankings as well.

This is just a quick note to announce that VM /ETC is continuing it’s partnership with Tradepub.com in 2010 in order to provide readers a great selection of free virtualization related whitepapers and magazines.

Also check out the VMETC.com whitepapers page often in the future for a rotating selection of publications that can be be downloaded or subscribed to as appropriate.

Here is my video of the GesaltIT Tech Field Day Party at The Computer History Museum in San Jose, CA. It’s not exactly high quality work, but provides some good images of the museum, the event and people, the presentation of the "thank you" gift to Stephen Foskett, and then Foskett’s appreciation speech for the event organizers and sponsors.

Sorry about the shaky video and frequent unfocused shots. I tried to edit out as much as possible without making the video hard to understand. Consider this my “Blair Rich” style of filming – except there are no “up my nostrils” angles. (if you saw the movie you’ll hopefully get that joke!)

GestaltIT Tech Field Day 1 Party from Rich Brambley on Vimeo.

I’ve also created a Vimeo album of all the Tech Field Day videos I could find. Check it out for several other of the attendees videos as well.

The video (in my video) on the screen was created by Marc Farley and Sunshine Mugrabi to set up our presentation of Foskett’s gift. Now, that’s a great video! I’ve embedded it here in this post, but it’s real home is on the StorageRap blog. Watch it too and see what everyone was laughing at!