Author: Eiad Al-Aqqad

  • VMware vSphere 5.1 new vCenter architecture & Single Sign on

    With the introduction of vSphere 5.1, VMware has introduced a new vCenter architecture & SSO ( Single Sign On). This is seems to be the first thing being noticed by customers when deploying vSphere 5.1 as its not exactly what they used to. Prior to vSphere 5.1 all vCenter services were installed at once on…

  • EMC VPLEX – vSphere 5.1 Stretched Cluster Best Practices

    The demand for across site VMotion and High Availability/Business continuity has shown an increase in the past year or so. I have started to see more customers implementing/considering such solution. I remember when VMware added support for vSphere stretched clusters about a year back, where only EMC VPLEX was on the Hardware Compatibility list. Actually…

  • Dell AppAssure Universal Backup

    Dell AppAssure was the winner of the 2012 Virtualization Review VMworld Best of Breed Awards as the Best Backup and Data Protection Product, which got me thinking what is so special about it. Further, if AppAssure did not have anything special about them Dell would not have enough to reason to happily acquire them back…

  • Top 5 vSphere Best Practices missed by the Enterprise

    As part of my job as a consultant at VMware, I get to deliver Health Check & Architecture Reviews engagement on regular basis. I have found quite few best practices that is generally missed by most & thought to document the top 5 in here for everyone to benefit. Maybe on the next round more…

  • Veeam Innovating again with Veeam Backup & Replication 6.5

    Veeam has always got me thrilled by how innovative they are when it come to virtual infrastructure backup & replication solutions. Every time they release a product, I think alright they have left nothing to surprise us with next release but each time they prove me wrong and here they do it again with Veeam…

  • vCloud Director joining VMs to specific Active Directory Domain OU

    While VMware vCloud Director 1.5.1 has a lot of flexibility, one thing it seems missing is getting VMs to join a specific OU in Active Directory Domain. Making your vApps VMs join a particular domain is quite easy using the vCloud Director web interface. All you have to do is to configure your domain information…

  • VMworld 2012 Top Announcements

    Every VMworld so far has carried out an over whelming number of innovative announcements that hit us over a short period of few days, & this VMworld is no exception. In this post, I have decided to summarize the top announcement made at VMworld 2012. I will start by pointing the ones announced today, &…

  • VMware Health Check Analyzer stuck

    Alright this post is dedicated to my colleagues at VMware as well VMware partners who got access to the VMware Health Check Analyzer and use it to help them collect data to include in their vSphere health check report. I have noticed when running the VMware Health Check analyzer with the default options against a…

  • PHD Virtual Backup version 6.0 is here

    By the time this article is published, PHD Virtual Backup version 6.0 has been announced. There were a few features that impressed me and thought I would try it out and see how well it performs in my lab. I will start covering the features from the least exciting to the most fascinating feature to…

  • Why VMware Load Based Teaming (LBT)

    VMware load based Teaming (LBT) is one of the great feature that was introduced a while back with vSphere 4.1, though it seems many admins have over looked it. As part of my job in consulting, I get to see many customers environments through out the year. It is really common to see customers who…

  • vCenter Orchestrator has no vCenter Server 5.0 plug-in tab

    After coming back to a VMware vCenter Orchestrator 4.2 in my home lab that i have installed a while back, I have noticed that the vCenter Orchestrator Configuration interface was not showing the vCenter Server 5.0 plug-in tab. Actually it was showing the vCenter 4.1 plugin tab. As soon I saw that I remembered that…

  • vCloud Director 1.5 step by step (Part1: Pre-requisite)

    I have finally come back to this, as I have been planning to do this for a while. I have for a while wanted to document how to create your own small vCloud environment maybe for a lab, demo, or just testing the product and learning how its setup. I have lately put different scattered…

  • VMware vSphere Backup Solution for the SMB

    Most enterprise have already spent tons of money on their enterprise backup solutions before adopting Virtualization, and were more likely to adapt the same backup solution after adopting Virtualization as long their backup vendor offer Virtualization integrated solution that fits their needs to save on cost. On the other hand, a large portion of small…

  • vCloud Director 1.5.1 not showing Blocking Tasks

    I have been doing some testing lately with vCloud Director 1.5.1 & working with blocking tasks was one of them. I have configured blocking tasks for “Instantiate vApp from Template”, so the task of deploying a vApp will be blocked and I get to approve it before continuing as shown in the below screen shot.…

  • How to move vCloud Director Database to a different SQL Sever?

    Ofter after you complete the implementation of your vCD you discover that your company need to decommission the MS Sql server you installed the database of you VMware vCloud Director Database on. This is only one reason why you would have to move a vCloud Director SQL Database to a new Database server, but everyday…