Tag: vCenter
Rebuilding Distributed Switch on New vCenter Instance Using a Backup
As you may have seen, I recently had a vCenter fail and after working with VMware Support it was determined that the vCenter should be rebuilt from scratch. Rebuilding the vCenter and adding the hosts that were in it was fairly easy. However, restoring their networking was another story. The hosts retained their previous network configuration, but I was unable…
Configuring VMware Backup with BDRSuite: A Step by Step Guide
If you’re looking to backup your VMware environment without having to install agents, then take a look at BDRSuite by Vembu! BDRSuite for VMware offers agentless VM Backup/Recovery for ESXi and vCenter as well as VM Replication Failover/Failback! Replication jobs have the ability to set up network and IP Mapping between source and destination environments for automatic Re-IPing in the…
Rebuilding a Failed vCenter Results in More Problems
At work, I had a vCenter fail and, after working with VMware support for hours, I was told to rebuild the vCenter from scratch. I downloaded the vCenter ISO for the same version as the other vCenters that are linked (7.0.3.01700) and launched the installer. I went through the wizard and selected to join it to the existing SSO Domain.…
PowerShell Script to Login to Multiple vCenter Servers
Do you have multiple vCenter servers that you interact with on a daily basis? Do you like to use PowerShell to manage them? I was opening a PowerShell window, and doing a connect-viserver for each and having to enter my PW over and over again. First, I tried to use the New-VICredentialStoreItem command to store my PW, but with security…
VMware VM Replication using BDRSuite – Overview
Ensuring the availability and continuity of vital virtual machines (VMs) is crucial in the fast-paced commercial world of today. VMware virtual machine replication with BDRSuite provides an affordable and dependable way to protect your important virtual machines. This comprehensive guide will take you through the main advantages, features, and best practices for using BDRSuite to create virtual machine replication. Key…
BDRSuite VMware VM Recovery
If you’re backing up your environment and not doing recovery tests, you may end up with big problems when it comes time to perform a recovery and run into problems! It’s always best to perform test restores to make sure your backups are running properly. Lets run through the restore process in BDRSuite! First, we need to login! In order…
PowerCLI Script to Change Tag Assignment
I have an environment where, using tags, unused VMs are automatically shutdown. This is done by creating a Tag Category called “Suspend Date” and when the current value is in the past, your VM gets shutdown. I don’t have many VMs that I own in this “test” environment, but the ones that I DO have there, I want to be…
Script to backup your vCenter DRS Rules
I was thinking yesterday, I have a script that I run on a monthly basis to backup my vDS configs… Shouldn’t I also have something that does the same for my DRS rules? So, I wrote a script that I can schedule to run on a weekly/monthly basis to backup my DRS rules. I have multiple vCenter servers, so I…
One of my favorite tools – Remote Desktop Manager by Devolutions
One of the tools I’ve been using for many years now is called Remote Desktop Manager by Devolutions. Based on the name, you’d think it’s just another RDP tool, but it’s much MUCH more! There are 2 versions of the product. There is a FREE version, which gives you limited functionality, and an ENTERPRISE version for full functionality. There is…
Adding a PowerShell Windows Update Script to my VMware Customizations
In my environments, we typically convert the templates to Virtual Machines once a quarter so we can install Windows Updates. This means, there could be a number of patches to install if you’re 2+ months out from the last time they were updated. So I decided to use a PowerShell script that my coworker wrote to do Windows Updates and…