ESXi.
- August 6, 2019
Failed ESXi Upgrade: Recovering When Update Manager Goes Wrong
ESXi host upgrades via vSphere Update Manager (VUM, now Lifecycle Manager in newer versions) are routine operations that usually go smoothly. When they don’t, the failure modes can range from …
- April 10, 2018
ESXi 5.5 to 6.5: The Upgrade Path Nobody Documents Completely
ESXi 5.5 reached end of general support in September 2018, creating real urgency to move environments that had been running the same version for three to four years. The upgrade path to 6.5 (the …
- December 5, 2017
EMC VNX with VMware ESXi: Multipath Configuration and What Goes Wrong
EMC storage arrays (VNX and VNXe in particular) were a common pairing with VMware in the 2015-2019 era for mid-market organizations. They’re capable arrays with good VMware integration, but the …
- December 14, 2016
ESXi Host Profiles: Configuration Consistency Across a Growing Cluster
In a two-host cluster, keeping ESXi hosts configured identically is manageable manually. By the time you have six or eight hosts, configuration drift is inevitable unless you have a systematic …
- May 9, 2016
Migrating from XenServer to VMware ESXi: The Practical Guide
At some point the XenServer environments I deployed for cost reasons hit a wall — either the organization’s needs grew beyond what XenServer’s ecosystem could support cleanly, or a …
- April 20, 2016
ESXi Networking Basics: vSwitches, Port Groups, and Where People Go Wrong
VMware’s virtual networking model is one of the most powerful things about the platform and one of the most common sources of misconfiguration in smaller deployments. The concepts are learnable …
- February 8, 2016
Starting with ESXi on Bare Metal: Hardware Selection for Small Business
The question I got asked most often when starting ESXi deployments for small and mid-size businesses: what hardware should we buy? The honest answer is “it depends,” but there are enough …
- March 31, 2015
XenServer vs VMware ESXi: A Practical Comparison for Small Business
I’ve deployed both XenServer and VMware ESXi for small-to-medium businesses, sometimes switching between them for the same client as their needs evolved. The right choice depends on several …