vSphere/ESXi: When good tasks go bad – Fix with ESXCLI via PowerCLI

Most of the time, tasks we start in vSphere just work. That’s why we love it. Queue ’em up, and move onto something else. Sometimes though, they go bad. They freeze, stick, die or just plain error out. This happened to me last week. After changing the scratch location for Continue Reading

ESXi/vSphere 5.5 U2: old NFS/vMotion issue reincarnated “remote host IP_Address failed with status Busy”

Uh oh, an old issue seems to have been reincarnated in vSphere 5.5 U2 which may cause vMotions of guests on NFS storage to fail with the error: remote host IP_Address failed with status Busy This issue was first evident some time ago where it affected V4.1 and was subsequently fixed Continue Reading

VMware ESXi CBT bug PT3 — ESXi 5.5 now fixed.

This now becomes the 3rd post regarding the infamous Changed Block Tracking bug that was/is evident in all versions of ESXi 4+. If you missed them, Part 1  &  Part 2 Finally today we see the bug squashed in ESXi 5.5 with the release of Patch ESXi-5.5.0-20150104001-standard (2099271). This still leaves Continue Reading

ESXi – Driver VIB update using ESXCLI

Nothing groundbreaking here folks, but this is a quick and easy way to upgrade the drivers (in this case Network Intel & Broadcom) on your host(s) I’ve done this many times for various reasons: Misbehaving drivers after upgrades, Version control, “’cause I wanna’”. etc Login to your host with the Continue Reading

VMware PowerCLI – Suppress vCenter Certificate warnings

A very quick post this one, but an annoying thing I often see left unchecked in environments, that is simple to fix in a minute. Yes, this is an old topic, but it’s still too evident today…. This should be in your “just do it” category. It’s the awful Certificate Continue Reading

EMC RecoverPoint: Error: Cannot register more than two arrays in RecoverPoint/SE

I was doing a fresh RecoverPoint 4.1 install recently, and everything wet very smoothly up until I attempted to enter the vCenter server details under the “Register vCenter Server” dialog. History shows this has been a little bit goofy in the past, with the MUI  certs and credential entry known Continue Reading

Auto ESXi Host Configuration Backups with PowerCLI

Regularly throughout the year, I like to take PIT (Point in Time) backups of my ESXi host configurations. These form part of my Critical Config backups that I hope I’ll never have to use. But like any backup, these are merely another safety net as we strive to have more Continue Reading

PowerCLI – Break glass in case of emergency

Nothing like a bit of Hyperbole, but some days are better than others! One thing I have learned over the years is to always expect the unexpected. Yesterday’s ‘unexpected‘ was one of these;               That’s cool, HA kicked in and the stranded guests began to Continue Reading