The three videos have totally changed my perception towards VMware and virtualization. Thanks for simplifying. And I look forward to more great videos such as HA. For instance If one virtual host has a breakdown then the second host can take over
You have it right! This is what I need to setup my new servers later this week when they arrive. You've explained everything in a clear and concise way.
Thanks Rob! Great videos and really helpful. Love to see the next video taking a newly created production vm and showing different methods of backing up the vm's and how quick one can be back up if a vm is compromised.
That is as simple as creating a clone of the VM just like was done @22:00. You can even take things further and automate the process by using PowerShell and VMwares PowerCLI cmdlets. All you'd have to do is create weekly (or however often you want) clones on another (generally larger slower) datastore and then if you ever need to restore, migrate the vm back over to your fast storage and power it on.
You saved my fright when you mentioned Thin Disk Mode. I didn't have 300GB laying around and I was scared what would happen if I hit continue. Awesome tutorial!
Thank you so much, just took over a small network at a new job. So this helps in understanding VMware as I'm still trying to make sense of things here, since there wasn't much documentation. Coming from homelab using Proxmox myself.
Hi i do not have any ESXI or FQDN and my ip address wont work do you have any method to by pass this question (3:18) I check and Is it the forest name for windows sever? Thanks alot
Great video. i just want to ask you at 5:28 when you specified ip address for vcenter server, it is not the ip address of your windows 10 machine? Did you already setup VM with ip 192.168.2.53 or you just randomly throw that ip address?
The settings specified on that page will be applied to the vCenter vm that is provisioned in the steps that follow, so really it just needs to be any IP on the subnet you are using that is not currently in use.
I am attempting to install 6.7 on a DellEMC. I cant seem to upgrade ESXI 6.0 to 6.7. I am not sure if this is causing issues with the VCSA 6.7 install as well. Seems to be having DNS issues but I am not connecting to a DNS service as this is an initial install and configuration. Is this required? Any suggestions?
Hi, I am very beginner I have an inquiry if I purchase a server to support my main computer Do I install programs that require a lot of effort on the server system, or do I install them on my main device In other words, can you take advantage of the power of the server processor on the programs on the primary computer?
Could you use a server as desktop replacement? Sure, but I would not. One of the biggest issues you will see is that servers generally will only have a single VGA for video out, so video out will be limited. In this situation, you wouldn't want to install something like ESXi as the base OS, but instead use something like Windows and then VMWare Workstation on top of that.
Hello MR.Willis , Thanks for this nice tutorial . One question please : How to install VMware vCenter 6.5 Server Appliance to a standalone PC in order to manage Hosts from outside , and not to include it as part of the HOST , because in case of problems with Host machine i am not able to access the VMware vCenter 6.5 Server Appliance anymore . Thanks again
Got any tips on how to shrink down the V-center's usage or Ram? I only have 16gb of ram (I assumed prices would go back to normal for ram... boy was I wrong) and have to make due with it which is difficult since Vcenter eats up 10 GB by default. I understand you can turn off services to shrink that down but was wondering if you knew of a quick guide to do it. Thanks
Where do download the trial of vCenter? If I goto www.vmware.com/try-vmware.html I don't see vCenter available. I did find a download link once I logged in but it is grayed out so I can't actually download it.
When you are on the try-vmware.html page, on the left hand side click on Downloads > vCloud Suite. You should find the vCenter links on that page. The links that are greyed out that usually means you don't have permission to download it but you can register for the products and get the trials.
Hi Willis Very nice and thank you very much for this video.. can you please help me with Virtual networking for ESXi and VCSA 6.5 installed on VMware workstation. and server 2012 as DHCP
Thanks again for the guide. Quick question though: I ran the VCSA installer and got to phase 2, but on the setup the progress bar freezes and nothing happens. Left it for more then 6 hours but no change.... I can still log into the vcenter though now with the IP I setup so I guess it worked? it still bothers me though
I've never had it happen like that, but I have had it not be able to reach the instance due to networking on phase 2 and it took forever to time out. Its sounds like in your case it as least started configuring the instance and 6 hrs should have been more than enough time for it to time out or complete. This would bug me as well :) You can always pull the installation logs and take a look through there.
@RobWillis Is installing vCenter Server onto a ESXi Host on bare metal hardware be considered as a "Nested ESXi" environment? Are there any drawbacks for doing this?
This is what you would call running vCenter as an appliance. You can run vCenter on top of an OS like Windows that is running on bare metal hardware, but the biggest draw back there is needing to manage and configure the OS, the same with the database required for vCenter and then updating it is usually not as easy as the appliance. Nested ESXi is something completely different and refers to running ESXi (a hypervisor) as a VM on another hypervisor which can be ESXi, Hyper-V, Xen, etc. This is generally done for test or demonstration purposes. A common example would be running ESXi as a VM on a Windows machine using VMware Workstation.
No I did not record that portion due to time and since the steps are exactly the same as the steps outlined in this video: robwillis.info/2017/07/installing-vmware-vsphere-esxi-6-5/ The only difference being the IP address used on the host.
Thank you very much for this amazing video. While installing vCenter 6.5.0, it got stuck at 80% "Installing RPM This may take several minutes...". In ESXi, the vCenter is listed under virtual machines and when I open it in remote console or browser, it says Root password is not set as well as RPM installation failed. Is there something I did not do right?. Thank you very much in advance.
Every time I have seen this happen it was caused by a networking issue and the VCSA VM wasn't able to reach back out to the installer to complete. For example if you do a nested install, the vSwitch on the main host needs to have promiscuous mode enabled (6.7 fixes this with native mac learning), other wise you see the install hang exactly where you are. Try to access the VM via console and check your network connectivity.
@@robwillisinfo I noticed that when it gets to 80%, installing RPM, the initial password used at the begenning of the installation gets overwritten. When I launced the VCSA in a remote console, it loads to password and confirm password prompt. I tried all the password combinations in the world but did not work so I started a search on Google and luckily found this link (www.altaro.com/vmware/reset-root-password-vcsa-6-x/). I did everything up to step 7 with the exception of the unmount command and when I returned to the installer, the 1st stage was complete. I hope this helps others. Thank you.
Was the ISO image you were using for the VCSA possibly older than a year? I have noticed in before that the root password embedded in the image seems to expire after a year and will cause similar issues.
Not sure if you mean did I have DNS for outbound connectivity and resolution? Yes. Or Did I have DNS in place because I used DNS names internally for the install? No I did not, I used IP's for all connectivity.
Rob Willis yeah internally. When I google about rpm taking several moments to install everyone says you have to have a dns server with forward and reverse lookup.
In the video there are 2 x ESXi 6.5 hypervisors that were built previously and then the vCenter Appliance is deployed as a regular virtual machine on top of one of the ESXi hyps, no upgrade is performed to the ESXi hypervisors themselves.
In this case I have a DHCP range configured on this particular subnet to issue IPs from .100-250, so I am just picking any IP that is not in use from .1-99. This is one of the items that I do not plan on spending any time on explaining, but there are plenty of resources already available on youtube that explain much better than I would about configuring static and DHCP addresses on your local network.
Currently trying to decide if I should install vCenter or not. Strictly speaking I guess I don't need it as I only have one host (Dell R710) with currently 7 VMs running (will ad more once I get more ram). Basically the only reason to install vCenter would be "because I can" I guess, but also I think there might be useful functions for managing stuff not otherwise available. What would you suggest? Any pros or cons to think of? (I'm running ESXi 6.5)
Even with only one host vCenter will give you the ability to clone VM's on that host as well as create templates for fast provisioning. The biggest reason not to though would be that it is going to take up a chunk of RAM and disk space. But to me, cloning alone is worth it :) Plus you can always try it out and then if you don't like or need it just delete the vCenter VM and go back to managing ESXi the same as before vCenter. It is always a good thing to get hands on time with vCenter too.
Yeah, the memory is a problem. I currently have 32GB and I keep getting warning and the used ram is always maxed out with the vCenter appliance running. (Going to buy some more to bring it up to at least 48GB soon). Do I have to have hosts in a cluster in order to migrate VMs? I have one virtual ESXi host running on another machine that can run a few light VMs and I was thinking of migrating some of the VMs on the Dell server to the secondary host using vCenter, but just can't make it work. (As you say cloning, and migrating are very good reasons to use vCenter). Maybe another video on managing VMs and doing things like cloning, migrating, clusters etc?
I usually buy server ram on the cheap on ebay. Look for someone liquidating hardware. The last time I got 24GB for $50 shipped. The hosts do not need to be in a cluster to migrate VMs, but there are some gotcha's around live migration. If you just need to move a vm or 2 you can also use something like SCP or Veeams Backup and Replication. Thanks for the suggestion! I may do some more VMware stuff in the future since there seems to be interest in it! VMware clusters are pretty awesome...hmm...
Hmm, is the requirement for migration less if I shut down the VM first? Or maybe use the standalone converter, does that make any difference? I have Veen downloaded but have yet to install and try it. I checked the fail report for the migrator and there was quite a "washing list" of things that wasn't OK (and that I didn't have a clue what it meant). I think there might be issues with my secondary ESXi host as it's running as a VM itself under VMM on a Xpenology NAS (with CPU compatibility mode disabled and apparently no way to turn it on).
Yes, if powered off you should be able to move the VM without issue as long as you have a compatible hyp and available resources on that hyp. If powered on you can change either the cpu/memory the host is running on OR the datastore, but not both at the same time. This is where shared storage and clusters start to shine. You can also live migrate a VM from one data store to another on the same host. As far as I know the converter is more for P2V. Either way, keep messing with it and you'll get it eventually :)
Thank You for not having a thick Indian accent. The instructions are clear and to the point.
Thank you Rob, it was well explained step by step and it is easy to understand all the topics which you have covered. Appreciate your video.
The three videos have totally changed my perception towards VMware and virtualization. Thanks for simplifying. And I look forward to more great videos such as HA. For instance If one virtual host has a breakdown then the second host can take over
Really fantastic tutorial here. Very fast and detailed explanation of the basic features. Enough to make one decide to start using this...Thanks
One of the best tutorials for V Center
You have it right! This is what I need to setup my new servers later this week when they arrive. You've explained everything in a clear and concise way.
Thank a lot Rob , entire vmware series was fantastic . You have covered most of the things and explained in very efficient and simplest way.
Thanks Rob! Great videos and really helpful. Love to see the next video taking a newly created production vm and showing different methods of backing up the vm's and how quick one can be back up if a vm is compromised.
That is as simple as creating a clone of the VM just like was done @22:00. You can even take things further and automate the process by using PowerShell and VMwares PowerCLI cmdlets. All you'd have to do is create weekly (or however often you want) clones on another (generally larger slower) datastore and then if you ever need to restore, migrate the vm back over to your fast storage and power it on.
Thank you for the three videos. it was a clear explanation. Could you please do another video explain what is the cluster and how to use it?
You saved my fright when you mentioned Thin Disk Mode. I didn't have 300GB laying around and I was scared what would happen if I hit continue.
Awesome tutorial!
Thank you so much, just took over a small network at a new job. So this helps in understanding VMware as I'm still trying to make sense of things here, since there wasn't much documentation. Coming from homelab using Proxmox myself.
I love your videos, Rob. Very easy to follow and comprehend.
Unbelievably straight-forward and helpful. Thank you so much for your time and effort on this!!
Hi i do not have any ESXI or FQDN and my ip address wont work do you have any method to by pass this question (3:18) I check and Is it the forest name for windows sever? Thanks alot
Thanks Rob, excellent video, really appreciate the time you put into it.
Thank you very much for explaining this topic very clearly and in brief manner!
Great videos rob. The way you have broken down the complexity is amazing. I have downloaded 3 videos. Any more coming out???
Very well done, great explanation with great visuals. :)
Thanks, these are great videos and very simple to understand. Very useful.
Thanks for posting. I’m a complete newbie and this helped a lot
Rob...Your videos are awesome easy to understand...Thank you so much sir.
Simply thought vmware matter of few hrs..great trainer thanks bro
Thank you very much Rob, excellent videos. I really appreciate your help.
Brilliant series of videos thanks a bunch
Very informative videos, Rob. Cheers!
Thanks Rob this 3 videos series is very useful
Thanks dude.. for enlightening the virtualization knowledge..hats off
Thanks Rob. That tutorial was awesome.
Awesome Video! Thanks, Rob for your time and effort!
Thanks Bob for this great video! You explain very well.
Thank you I did not realize you can deploy to esxi from windows, i thought you had to deploy via ova from the esxi host page
It's been a while but I am pretty sure the older versions were that way, the Windows deployment method is new with starting with v6 I believe.
@@robwillisinfo Appreciate it this will simplify my lab deployments
Thank you so much for this video! 😊👍
This has help me to do the same in others Servers, your three videos of ESXi are amazing! 😁💻
Great video. i just want to ask you at 5:28 when you specified ip address for vcenter server, it is not the ip address of your windows 10 machine? Did you already setup VM with ip 192.168.2.53 or you just randomly throw that ip address?
The settings specified on that page will be applied to the vCenter vm that is provisioned in the steps that follow, so really it just needs to be any IP on the subnet you are using that is not currently in use.
I am attempting to install 6.7 on a DellEMC. I cant seem to upgrade ESXI 6.0 to 6.7. I am not sure if this is causing issues with the VCSA 6.7 install as well. Seems to be having DNS issues but I am not connecting to a DNS service as this is an initial install and configuration. Is this required? Any suggestions?
Excellent video. Well done!
Hi, I am very beginner
I have an inquiry if I purchase a server to support my main computer
Do I install programs that require a lot of effort on the server system, or do I install them on my main device
In other words, can you take advantage of the power of the server processor on the programs on the primary computer?
Could you use a server as desktop replacement? Sure, but I would not. One of the biggest issues you will see is that servers generally will only have a single VGA for video out, so video out will be limited. In this situation, you wouldn't want to install something like ESXi as the base OS, but instead use something like Windows and then VMWare Workstation on top of that.
Hello MR.Willis , Thanks for this nice tutorial . One question please : How to install VMware vCenter 6.5 Server Appliance to a standalone PC in order to manage Hosts from outside , and not to include it as part of the HOST , because in case of problems with Host machine i am not able to access the VMware vCenter 6.5 Server Appliance anymore . Thanks again
Got any tips on how to shrink down the V-center's usage or Ram? I only have 16gb of ram (I assumed prices would go back to normal for ram... boy was I wrong) and have to make due with it which is difficult since Vcenter eats up 10 GB by default. I understand you can turn off services to shrink that down but was wondering if you knew of a quick guide to do it. Thanks
Where do download the trial of vCenter? If I goto www.vmware.com/try-vmware.html I don't see vCenter available. I did find a download link once I logged in but it is grayed out so I can't actually download it.
When you are on the try-vmware.html page, on the left hand side click on Downloads > vCloud Suite. You should find the vCenter links on that page. The links that are greyed out that usually means you don't have permission to download it but you can register for the products and get the trials.
Hi Willis
Very nice and thank you very much for this video..
can you please help me with Virtual networking for ESXi and VCSA 6.5 installed on VMware workstation. and server 2012 as DHCP
How to check the Current CPU left in the ESXi like total 16 core then how much is in use and how much left ( not in % form required in the cores form)
PowerCLI is probably going to be your best bet for something like this.
but is there command or script you can refer that would be much appreciated :)
Thanks again for the guide. Quick question though: I ran the VCSA installer and got to phase 2, but on the setup the progress bar freezes and nothing happens. Left it for more then 6 hours but no change.... I can still log into the vcenter though now with the IP I setup so I guess it worked? it still bothers me though
I've never had it happen like that, but I have had it not be able to reach the instance due to networking on phase 2 and it took forever to time out. Its sounds like in your case it as least started configuring the instance and 6 hrs should have been more than enough time for it to time out or complete. This would bug me as well :) You can always pull the installation logs and take a look through there.
Great video. Very helpful! Thank you.
Amazing... This has helped a lot :).. Thanks Again Rob
Perfect tutorial. Thanks
Do i really need a license for this and vmware?
@RobWillis Is installing vCenter Server onto a ESXi Host on bare metal hardware be considered as a "Nested ESXi" environment? Are there any drawbacks for doing this?
This is what you would call running vCenter as an appliance. You can run vCenter on top of an OS like Windows that is running on bare metal hardware, but the biggest draw back there is needing to manage and configure the OS, the same with the database required for vCenter and then updating it is usually not as easy as the appliance. Nested ESXi is something completely different and refers to running ESXi (a hypervisor) as a VM on another hypervisor which can be ESXi, Hyper-V, Xen, etc. This is generally done for test or demonstration purposes. A common example would be running ESXi as a VM on a Windows machine using VMware Workstation.
Great Video, Rob. Do you have a video on making your second ESXi Host, by chance? The .53 host? Thanks.
No I did not record that portion due to time and since the steps are exactly the same as the steps outlined in this video:
robwillis.info/2017/07/installing-vmware-vsphere-esxi-6-5/
The only difference being the IP address used on the host.
Thank you very much for this amazing video. While installing vCenter 6.5.0, it got stuck at 80% "Installing RPM This may take several minutes...". In ESXi, the vCenter is listed under virtual machines and when I open it in remote console or browser, it says Root password is not set as well as RPM installation failed. Is there something I did not do right?.
Thank you very much in advance.
Machine specs: Dell Precision T3500 with 2 x Intel Xeon W3520 @2.67GHz and 16GB of memory installed.
Every time I have seen this happen it was caused by a networking issue and the VCSA VM wasn't able to reach back out to the installer to complete. For example if you do a nested install, the vSwitch on the main host needs to have promiscuous mode enabled (6.7 fixes this with native mac learning), other wise you see the install hang exactly where you are. Try to access the VM via console and check your network connectivity.
@@robwillisinfo I will do so. Thank you once again.
@@robwillisinfo I noticed that when it gets to 80%, installing RPM, the initial password used at the begenning of the installation gets overwritten. When I launced the VCSA in a remote console, it loads to password and confirm password prompt. I tried all the password combinations in the world but did not work so I started a search on Google and luckily found this link (www.altaro.com/vmware/reset-root-password-vcsa-6-x/). I did everything up to step 7 with the exception of the unmount command and when I returned to the installer, the 1st stage was complete.
I hope this helps others. Thank you.
Was the ISO image you were using for the VCSA possibly older than a year? I have noticed in before that the root password embedded in the image seems to expire after a year and will cause similar issues.
Thanks brother! Great videos.
Did you have a DNS server running prior to this installation? Mine gets stuck at Installing RPM this may take several moments
Not sure if you mean did I have DNS for outbound connectivity and resolution? Yes. Or Did I have DNS in place because I used DNS names internally for the install? No I did not, I used IP's for all connectivity.
Rob Willis yeah internally. When I google about rpm taking several moments to install everyone says you have to have a dns server with forward and reverse lookup.
SUPERB VIDS AMIGO!!!
Bro, you should redo these VMware videos with the latest versions and newer technologies like VDI
What do you do after 2 months? Do you have a license purchased?
Best regards.
You either rebuild or add in a license. Luckily rebuilding isnt too bad and scripts can help.
Thank you Rob
Thank you for the videos, Thumbs up!!!!
did you upgraded the esxi host or it keeps running both??
In the video there are 2 x ESXi 6.5 hypervisors that were built previously and then the vCenter Appliance is deployed as a regular virtual machine on top of one of the ESXi hyps, no upgrade is performed to the ESXi hypervisors themselves.
Where do you get a IP address
In this case I have a DHCP range configured on this particular subnet to issue IPs from .100-250, so I am just picking any IP that is not in use from .1-99. This is one of the items that I do not plan on spending any time on explaining, but there are plenty of resources already available on youtube that explain much better than I would about configuring static and DHCP addresses on your local network.
Thanks!
great content
Great video. Thanks so much! Ezpz
nice tutorials..
Currently trying to decide if I should install vCenter or not. Strictly speaking I guess I don't need it as I only have one host (Dell R710) with currently 7 VMs running (will ad more once I get more ram). Basically the only reason to install vCenter would be "because I can" I guess, but also I think there might be useful functions for managing stuff not otherwise available.
What would you suggest? Any pros or cons to think of? (I'm running ESXi 6.5)
Even with only one host vCenter will give you the ability to clone VM's on that host as well as create templates for fast provisioning. The biggest reason not to though would be that it is going to take up a chunk of RAM and disk space. But to me, cloning alone is worth it :) Plus you can always try it out and then if you don't like or need it just delete the vCenter VM and go back to managing ESXi the same as before vCenter. It is always a good thing to get hands on time with vCenter too.
Yeah, the memory is a problem. I currently have 32GB and I keep getting warning and the used ram is always maxed out with the vCenter appliance running. (Going to buy some more to bring it up to at least 48GB soon).
Do I have to have hosts in a cluster in order to migrate VMs? I have one virtual ESXi host running on another machine that can run a few light VMs and I was thinking of migrating some of the VMs on the Dell server to the secondary host using vCenter, but just can't make it work. (As you say cloning, and migrating are very good reasons to use vCenter).
Maybe another video on managing VMs and doing things like cloning, migrating, clusters etc?
I usually buy server ram on the cheap on ebay. Look for someone liquidating hardware. The last time I got 24GB for $50 shipped. The hosts do not need to be in a cluster to migrate VMs, but there are some gotcha's around live migration. If you just need to move a vm or 2 you can also use something like SCP or Veeams Backup and Replication. Thanks for the suggestion! I may do some more VMware stuff in the future since there seems to be interest in it! VMware clusters are pretty awesome...hmm...
Hmm, is the requirement for migration less if I shut down the VM first? Or maybe use the standalone converter, does that make any difference? I have Veen downloaded but have yet to install and try it. I checked the fail report for the migrator and there was quite a "washing list" of things that wasn't OK (and that I didn't have a clue what it meant). I think there might be issues with my secondary ESXi host as it's running as a VM itself under VMM on a Xpenology NAS (with CPU compatibility mode disabled and apparently no way to turn it on).
Yes, if powered off you should be able to move the VM without issue as long as you have a compatible hyp and available resources on that hyp. If powered on you can change either the cpu/memory the host is running on OR the datastore, but not both at the same time. This is where shared storage and clusters start to shine. You can also live migrate a VM from one data store to another on the same host. As far as I know the converter is more for P2V. Either way, keep messing with it and you'll get it eventually :)
HERO! TY Fame