My first vcb with graphical user interface and this could be a replacement for my previous vcb script. I believe this could be a great tools for backup your ESX virtual machines. Hmm maybe I need some touch-up here and there specially on skin & etc. BTW, it's already been tested successfully to backup my scalix virtual machine from windows XP.

 

To do:

Skin

Unmount option previous mounted snapshot

Autocreate batch file for schedule Backup

Progress bar

 

 

ariyossss

athlon_crazy 5/01/2009 3:00pm 

Totally crap! My ESX server is down for almost 24 hours yesterday due to my NAS machine hardware failure (HDD). One of the Datastore (IDE) frequently cause my nas machine hanged. When it's hanged, both datastore (IDE & SATA) showed in ESX as "inactive". All virtual machine (2) running inside this datastore (IDE) can't be recovered while on the SATA (8) I managed to have all of it. Lucky for my scalix mail server, I just need 2 hours to do SLES10 & Scalix mail server installation and make all services working as normal.

 

Lesson to learn - Implement VCB a.s.a.p

 

ariyossss 28/12/2008 14:22pm 

VMware Consolidated Backup provides a centralized backup facility that leverages a centralized proxy server and reduces the load on production VMware ESX hosts. You can backup your virtual machine at anytime with full or incremental file backup or full image backup.

As you all know, not so many user impress with the vcb because by default vcb you need to run it via windows shell / cmd. I believe this shouldn't give any problem to any VMware expertise but for new user, perhaps CLi some time give them some headache.

c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Consolidated Backup Framework\vcbMounter.exe ....

Above command line without proper parameter will cause your ESX server failed to create virtual machine snapshot. To minimize this error, you can do few things for user :

• Batch Script
• Custom VCB Script (User Interaction)

You can find few vcb batch script on the net which can run vcb backup for you automatically. Modify it to meet your need and simply shedule it to run on specific time and date. This script very useful if you have so many virtual machine that need to have some backup.

Custom script with user interaction is very useful for new vcb user, vcb testing and for environment which have less virtual machine. The script really need user input to complete all necessary vcb parameter and then run the backup process base on what parameter entered by the user.

As for my own use, I create a very simple script. Yes it's simple since I don't know much on windows programming but hey, it's fully tested and fuctional for ESX virtual machine backup. By the way, this is how my custom script looks like when you run it :-

 

Browse virtual machine.

 

Backup virtual machine 

 

At this moment, I'm completing another version of vcb tools with GUI using visual basic programming language.

ariyossss
athlon_crazy 24122008 06:00am

Another hands-on experience on the blade server today but this time HP Blade c7000 with HP StorageWork (EVA). I've got my chance to play with it since BSN prefer HP Blade rather than IBM. Unfortunately this c7000 doesn't come with cd/dvd rom panel, so I must do the installation from my laptop connect to the blade ILO which is too slow for the ESX installation. Unlike IBM Blade in JKR last time, I can simply put the cd/dvd into the blade, press the button to activate cd/dvd drive on any blade I want and proceed with the installation. 

 

I noticed HP blade using smaller fan for their each blade while IBM using two big blowers for their entire blade.  

 

About the blade hardware specification, each blade (6) come with 2x Quad core AMD Opteron 2Ghz processor, 16GB memory and 2x 72GB SAS drive. The local drive solely for ESX installation and all virtual machine will be sitting inside HP SAN (EVA) with 5TB capacity. 

 

We can manage HP blade via web config but it's really confusing for people who without any blade experience. I also take time to learn just how to mount the cdrom / iso image from my laptop. There got two type of terminal for remote. If you are using windows you can choose terminal which need remote desktop as backend plus internet explorer while if you are using linux like me, you can use remote via firefox based on JRE.

 

 

Front and rear view of Blade c7000

 

 

 

ariyossss

athlon_crazy 15/11/2008 8:54am