Sidney Smith

There are many reasons to install VMware ESX in text mode. The main reasons I use text mode are that it seems quicker for me and text mode responds better when using remote console connections, such as iLo, DRAC or console over IP. Previous versions of VMware used a text mode that incorporated Anaconda and [...] ... (more)

vSphere Install and Upgrade Best Practices KB Articles and Links

So, I use NewsGator to aggregate a BAZILLION feeds from several sources, blogs, like this one, actual news feeds and a bunch of VMware feeds. The VMware feeds are from the VI:OPS and VMTN forums. The VMTN forums allow you to create a custom feed by selecting the RSS link at the bottom right of [...] ... (more)

VMTN: I/O Performance in vSphere, Block Sizes and Disk Alignment

Yes folks, it rears its ugly head again…Disk Alignment… If you have not read it yet, check out the whitepaper on disk alignment from VMware. First, chethan from VMware posted a great thread on VMTN about I/O performance in vSphere. The start of the thread talks about I/O, then leads into anice discussion about block size. [...] ... (more)

More on Cisco UCS, HP Matrix and ITaaS

I just finished reading Project California: a Data Center Virtualization Server - UCS (Unified Computing System) from Cisco. It gave an excellent take on Cisco’s view of how UCS benefits a datacenter. It also explains how new technologies from Intel, QLogic and Emulex all complement the Cisco gear. As a matter of fact, the first [...] ... (more)

Is Your Blade Ready for Virtualization?

Virtualization at Cloud Expo I attended the second day of the HP Converged Infrastructure Roadshow in NYC last week. Most of the day was spent watching PowerPoints and demos for the HP Matrix stuff and Virtual Connect. Then came lunch. I finished my appetizer and realized that the buffet being set up was for someone else. My appetizer was actually lunch! Thanks God there was cheesecake on the way… There was a session on unified storage, which mostly covered the LeftHand line. At one point, I asked if the data de-dupe was source based or destination based. The “engineer” looked... (more)