Friday, September 30, 2005

Enhancements to VMTN Discussion Forums

Read the post...new private messaging, reward points, and more!

posted by Kevin @ 9:37 PM 0 comments

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

Good Technology Officially Certifies on VMware ESX Server

The announcement came in their e-newsletter as follows:

Good Certifies on VMware ESX Server

Good is pleased to announce our certification on VMwares ESX Server 2.5 and 2.5.1, the industry-leading product for server consolidation. For customers wishing to take dvantage of the lower total cost of ownership that comes from running multiple applications on a single server, ESX Server allows enterprises to lower hardware acquisition and maintenance costs, consolidate idle system resources and increase operational efficiency. The ability to co-locate the GoodLink server with other important applications on a single physical server will enable customers to shrink their total cost of ownership in building mobile solutions. To find out more about VM Wares ESX Server, visit http://www.vmware.com/solutions/consolidation/.


My enterprise wasn't part of the certification group but we migrated our Goodlink server over to a VM at the end of May and have had no issues. The project was a P2V of our original server as well.

posted by Kevin @ 2:07 PM 0 comments

Monday, September 26, 2005

Unix Admin Corner: Solaris Express/VMware video

If you have a video problem with VMware and Solaris express, check out this tip from a blogger.

posted by Kevin @ 5:54 PM 0 comments

Sunday, September 25, 2005

VMware To Debut Next-Gen ESX 3.0, VirtualCenter 2.0

virtualization.info picked up this story from CRN. Sounds like the next version has scaled up in memory and processor as well as allowing a grid computing approach. Can't wait!

posted by Kevin @ 9:54 PM 0 comments

Friday, September 23, 2005

virtualization.info: VMware releases VirtualCenter 1.3

I've been waiting for it to see the changes. Don't know when I'll upgrade. We'll see how the day goes...

posted by Kevin @ 7:53 AM 0 comments

Sunday, September 18, 2005

virtualization.info: VMware ESX Server 2.5.2 released, VirtualCenter 1.3 expected soon

As Alessandro points out, Virtual Center 1.3 will be out soon. I've even read this week. I'm looking forward to getting it and see what changes they've made. I hope the performance charts have been reworked. They are not useful beyond the 24 hour mark because they don't average the results over time. Instead, they choose one point in time and plot it on the graph. So in the week view, you have one plot point for each hour. I don't know about you but CPU utilization and memory fluctuate too often for this to even come close to being an accurate graph.

posted by Kevin @ 10:10 PM 0 comments

Friday, September 16, 2005

Busy summer for VMware

TechTarget summarizes the goings on at VMware this summer.

posted by Kevin @ 9:08 PM 0 comments

Thursday, September 15, 2005

The Virtues of Virtualization - Editorial - CIO

Read about J.R. Simplot's use of VMware ESX as well as a general case made for virtualization in the enterprise.

posted by Kevin @ 1:48 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

virtualization.info: VMware newsgroups almost dead

Don't be dismayed by the title of Mr. Perilli's latest post...he points out the important fact that VMware's new Web Community is now redone and ready to serve as a premiere stopping place for technical exchange. Spread the word...we're all in this together!

posted by Kevin @ 6:57 AM 0 comments

Friday, September 09, 2005

Parallels, Inc Offers Competing Workstation Product

Another offering in the virtual workstation arena. Free trial download. Of course, I recommend you compare it to VMware's Workstation 5 product. It has a free trial too.

posted by Kevin @ 1:40 PM 0 comments

Virtual Machine Technology | Going Virtual | September 14, 2005 | Network Computing

A review of the top virtual products available with a nice chart show the capabilities of each. VMware has 3 products listed, Microsoft 2 and open source 1. VMware's ESX Server 2.1 gets a nod in the article and is recognized as a unique offering others don't have. This is what we're running and we're a Microsoft shop.

posted by Kevin @ 10:55 AM 0 comments

Phil Windley's Technometria | Virtualize Everything

Phil thinks virtualization will be commoditized over the coming years as Intel and AMD build hardware that supports it. He thinks VMware will need to make money in the future by offering management and automation tools. I would assume VMware's P2V tool would fall into this area.

The hypervisor layer which will accomplish all this will be something to watch. Pushing virtualization down into hardware make a lot of sense. Where will it lead software vendors? Time will tell.

posted by Kevin @ 6:53 AM 0 comments

ChipLog: The view looks good from up here

libview has been released providing widgets to use inside the VMware Workstation code base.

posted by Kevin @ 6:51 AM 0 comments

VMware offers migration freebie | News.blog | CNET News.com

This is a great way to get this tool and assistance during a migration. We did something similiar with a vendor getting onsite training on the P2V tool and ended up getting a copy of it for ourselves as well. We've migrated 8 servers to our ESX installation using the software and I've even P2V'd my desktop!

posted by Kevin @ 6:48 AM 0 comments

Thursday, September 08, 2005

virtualization.info: VMware Workstation 5 upgrade for Microsoft Certified Trainers

Program opportunity still exists...

posted by Kevin @ 6:53 AM 0 comments

VMware Workstation 5 Garners Industry Accolades

More industry praise for VMware...

posted by Kevin @ 6:53 AM 0 comments

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

TaoSecurity uses VMware to test security

Read how Workstation 5 is being used to teach students about security.

posted by Kevin @ 12:12 AM 0 comments

Techlog highlights timekeeping white paper

Steven over at Techlog.org points to one of VMware's helpful papers on straightening out the whole host/guest time interaction. If you run a domain where everything needs to stay in sync and you have a virtualized domain controller, read the paper. It may help you avoid problems before they start.

posted by Kevin @ 12:09 AM 0 comments

VMware Download: P2V Assistant 2.1 Beta

VC pdt mgr has this to say about the product...
The product called VMware P2V Assistant is comprised of two pieces, the bootCD and the Assistant. In this release, we've added significant new hardware support and functionality to the BootCD.


VMware P2V bootCD enhancements:

- Improved hardware support with new Linux 2.6 kernel: Specifically focused on ensuring a broad and stable level of support for storage (IDE, SCSI, and hardware RAID) and networking (10/100 and gigabit Ethernet) devices.

- Full-featured graphical desktop interface: The P2V bootCD now automatically boots into a network-enabled, full-featured graphical desktop interface upon startup.

Based on the Linux Live CD distribution Knoppix 3.8.1, this release includes all the tools you'd expect to have on a full desktop OS installation, including web browser support, graphical tools for configuring and setting up disks and network devices, and much more.

- Hardware Support Customizer tool: To ensure the P2V bootCD works reliably across hardware that isn't explicitly recognized by the hardware support database shipped with the product, we've developed a graphical tool to allow customers to add their own hardware to the list of recognized devices.

posted by Kevin @ 12:05 AM 0 comments

virtualization.info: Upgrade from Workstation 5 to VMTN Subscription

If you want to keep up with the latest code and get access to pre-built VM images to speed development, consider this upgrade offer running now. Alessandro has the links.

posted by Kevin @ 12:02 AM 0 comments