It’s been a good
six weeks since the last Tech Round Up due to holidays and work commitments;
here are a few notes and bookmarks to things found as new, useful, or
interesting in October! With stuff from: Cisco, Citrix,
EMC, Google, Juniper Networks,
Microsoft,
NetApp,
Veeam, VMware, and Ultimate Storage
## Cisco ##
Cisco have
announced a free (Essential Edition) version of their Nexus 1000V 2.1
(currently in beta). Features include: VLAN, ACL, QoS, VXLAN, vPath, LACP,
Multicast, Netflow, ERSPAN, Management, vTacker, vCenter Plug-in
## Citrix ##
A very good blog
post describing the hard to understand way PVS uses memory for caching disk
operations!
Might be handy if
you need to do a health check of a Citrix XenApp environment!
“In 4 easy steps
you can analyze your log files, profile your XenApp environment and scan for
hundreds of known issues. It takes only minutes to deliver clear, actionable
advice customized to you.
1. Download and Run
Citrix Scout -
generates diagnostic log files from your XenApp environment.
2. Upload the log
file to Citrix Auto
Support – See here for how to generate diagnostic data for other
supported products.
3. Wait a few
minutes – the file will be parsed and measured against hundreds of parameters.
4. Review the results”
XenServer 6.1 is
out! Check out the release notes for new features and enhancements.
How NetScaler can
help you with your IPv4 to IPv6 transitioning!
## EMC ##
Reminds me that I
need to get some EMC certs!
## Google ##
## Juniper Networks ##
An interesting
design with:
2x Juniper Networks
EX4550 switches = 2u
4x Dell D820
PowerEdge™ Server = 8u
2x Dell PowerVault™
MD3600i 10GbE iSCSI Array & 12 600GB 15K SAS = 4u
And vGW Kernel
Interaction:
## Microsoft ##
1. Storage Spaces
2. Hyper-V 3
3. PowerShell 3.0
4. Failover
clusters
5. Data deduplication
6. SMB 3.0
7. Scale-out file server
> Can convert and deploy
VMs from VMware hosts running either vSphere 4.1 or 5.0 to Hyper-V hosts on
Windows Server 2012,
by migrating configuration such as memory, virtual processor and by adding
virtual network interface cards.
> Converts VMware
virtual disks to Microsoft Virtual Hard Disks (VHDs)
> Uninstalls VMware tools prior to conversion and installs Integration
Services if the guest OS is Windows Server 2003 SP2 and above
> Supports Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2008 and Windows
Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 guest Operating Systems.
> Scriptable command-line interface and wizard-driver GUI
PowerShell scripts
to help you build your 2012 IaaS clouds.
A nice review from
The Register of System Center 2012 and its components!
Perhaps a bit old
now with Exchange 2013 imminent, but a useful interactive tool for planning
your upgrade to Exchange 2010 on-premises or in the cloud!
“As I understand it
there is no longer a need
to split off the various networking duties but finding the references (I
heard them in person) is a bit difficult at this time.”
## NetApp ##
Excellent videos on
using the NetApp VSC 4.1 (Virtual Storage Console plugin for vSphere and
XenCenter)!
## Veeam ##
Veeam Backup & Replication 6.5 is out now!
Including:
> Free
e-discovery and item recovery for Microsoft Exchange
> Easy VM
recovery from SAN snapshots
> New hypervisor
support: vSphere 5.1 and Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V
And here http://www.vclouds.nl/2012/10/25/veeam-backup-replication-v6-5-is-now-available/
and in lots of other places J
Veeam Community Forums Digest October 1 – October 7, 2012
“Veeam is building network traffic verification
right into the product's engine. With this in place, you can be always sure
that the remote backup or replica receives the exact same data as source proxy
has sent. And, should the in-transmit data corruption be detected, bad data
blocks will be resent automatically without any impact on the job (in the end,
no one wants 1TB full backup over WAN to fail at 99%). We will be squeezing
this feature right into the upcoming B&R 6.5 release!”
An interesting
debate from the Veeam forums!
## VMware ##
“VMware recommends
that ESXi has a persistent scratch location available for storing temporary
data including logs, diagnostic information, and system swap. (This is not a
requirement, however.)”
Which can be
configured for the vSphere Client >
Advanced Settings > ScratchConfig : ScratchConfig.ConfiguredScratchLocation
Interesting
walkthrough to show how it’s done!
Great article for those
interested in vCloud Design!
Using the vSphere
Web Client 5.1!
Came across this
pdf from VMware Professional Services which serves as an interesting template
for a professional services engagement! The vCheck health report from here is a very
handy tool for this purpose.
Phases of
Virtualization:
## Ultimate Storage ##
Interesting if you’re
looking for prices for certain (value) storage vendors, including – QNAP,
Synology, Quantum, QSAN, Overland Storage …
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