1) How we manage licenses, i.e. timely updating licenses, briefly explain?

- If you are managing your license as host based then you need to purchas
e the new license once you got new ESX. If you are managing your centralized lic
ense server for your VMware VI3 firm then you can add the new license files in y
our license server through VC server. If you are having vSphere firm then you ca
n add your new license files else you can get in touch with VMware license suppo
rt team and get your license merged i.e. existing + new and get a full and final
single license key for your vSphere firm.
2) If we found HA issue, what are steps we follow?
- HA works based on your DNS configuration so check if your ESX is able
to resolve by its hostname or not. If you are having ESX 3.x then check if the
ESX hostname which should NOT be in upper case. Check if any specific constraint
s are there in your data center physical firewall in between several ESX hosts (
if any recent ESX has been build). Check the No. of ESX failure selected in your
HA setting, it should be properly calculated based on ur firm. If you are havin
g VM affinity/anti-affinity rules has been configured or not. etc etc.
3) Redundancy between NICs in an ESX server?
- Network redundancy is mainly required for ur esx if you have configur
ed all the futures. However this redundancy is for service console network port
group. You can configure 2 SC with different IPs and get it connected from diffe
rent network sources for high availability of ur ESX/SC
4) Minimum requirements for VMotion configure?
- ESX h/w generation should be in compatible to each other. Should in s
ame network without any constraints. ESX version should b in same firm (ESX 3.x
or ESX 4.x or ESX 2.x etc). Gigabit NIC should be configured for VMkernel/Vmotio
n port group. VMs should not have RDM. VMs should not have configured under affi
nity/anti-affinity rules. Enough license should be there for Vmotion based on yo
ur ESX CPU count. Should have common storage among ur esx hosts. etc etc.
5) How many licenses require for CPU quad core?
- Its very simple, 1 VI3 license instance is for 2CPUs (each cpu dual c
ore max) but vSphere license instance if for 1 CPU (8 core max). CPUs are based
on ur ESX host not VMs.
6) How many licenses require for an ESX server?
- Its an trick question, if your ESX is a standalone box then one host
based license in more than enough. If you are having the ESX host is managing un
der VC server then it depends on the existing license you have purchased, if its
not enough u need one more server based license (standard/enterprise etc)
7) Whether we need licenses for HA, DRS features?
- Off course yes, go to ur VC server and check the license section, you
will get the license details for ur existing firm. Licenses depends on ur esx c
pu count. Refer the Question 5
8) What should be the main reason for purple screen errors?
- Might be your SC memory got exhausted. Might be the resource crunch c
ame in ur firm. Might be the mis-configuration have done in esx kernel level (wh
ich affects after reboot). Might be some application have been installed in ur e
sx and it went nasty. Might be ur using esx profile to build ur esx which have h
/w incompatibility. Might be ur new h/w is not suitable for esx (check esx H/W c
ompatibility list/guide) before installing esx. Etc etc
9) How to configure virtual switches?
- Do it in VC under configuration, networking, edit/create or do it in
SC by using the command esxcfg command, for more details go through man page.
10) whether HA use vmotion or not?
- NO
11) whether DRS use vmotion or not?
- YES
12) what are processes & port numbers for virtual center, HA running in ESX?
Management service, Port No: 2050, 5000(Traffic between ESX Server hosts for VMw
are High Availability), 8042/8045 (Traffic between ESX Server hosts for HA)
13) In ESX2.5.2 how we take backups of vm files?
- Manually, VCB tools, Storage level backup is suggested.
14) Explain the purpose of Redo log files?
- Mainly the data store on which the VM resides is out of disk space. S
pecially it related to the lack of storage space by which the VM is not expandin
g its swap memory or I/O operation etc etc
15) Shall we install vista on VMs? Explain
- Yes off course we can, 64 bit vista is suggested. Follow the normal p
rocess of windows OS build.
16) why we use two ports for licenses, 27000 and 27010?
- 27000 for License transactions from ESX Server to the license server
& 27010 is for License transactions from the license server
17) Explain VC?
VC provides a scalable and extensible platform that forms the foundation for vir
tualization management. It centrally manages ur VMware environments which is all
owing d IT administrators dramatically improved control over the virtual environ
ment compared to other management platforms. Provides centralized control and vi
sibility at every level of virtual infrastructure.
18) Difference between ESX3.0 & 3.5?
ESX3.5 :-
- Expanded Storage options and support for SATA.
- 10GB Ethernet support and Jumbo Frames support
- Para-virtualized Linux Guest operating systems
- Support for Virtual Guests with 64GB of RAM and Physical hosts with 1
28GB of memory
- VMware Storage VMotion
- VMware Update Manager
- VMware Distributed Power Management
- VMware Guided Consolidation
- Improved VMFS features which performs extremely outstanding
ESX 3.0 :-
- Support for Virtual Guests with 16GB of RAM (linux VMs are not detect
ing 16GB RAM)
- By default, 64-bit guests are now visible in the VI Client and marked
as "experimental.
- NO VMware Storage VMotion
- NO VMware Update Manager
- NO VMware Distributed Power Management
- NO VMware Guided Consolidation
- NO Jumbo Frames support in V switches
19) Briefly describe about update Manager?
- it is an automated patch management solution for ESX hosts, as well a
s for windows and Linux VMs. It scans the state of the physical ESX hosts, as we
ll as select guest operating systems, compares them with baselines set by the ad
ministrator and then applies updates and patches to enforce compliance to baseli
nes. Update Manager is fully integrated with DRS for non-disruptive ESX and ESXi
host patching. Update Manager scans and remediates online, as well as offline/s
uspended virtual machines and online ESX hosts. The software also reduces the ri
sk of virtual machine patch failures with a snapshot feature that can rollback a
patched virtual machine to a known working state if there are any problems.
20) Explain Vmware Snaphot?
- It is used to preserve the state of the VM, so u can return to d same
stage repeatedly. It captures the entire state of vms as listed below.
Memory state, disk state, settings state
Use the below command to manage the snapshots
#vmware-cmd <.vmx file name> createsnapshot <name>
# vmware-cmd <.vmx file name> revertsnapshot
# vmware-cmd <.vmx file name> hassnapshot
# vmware-cmd <.vmx file name> removesnapshot