This article is very much in draft form, a work in progress, with many changes at any time these next few days. The only change in this release is "Added patch for Intel SPI vulnerability," seen in the release notes, not to be confused with Intel® AMT Critical Firmware Vulnerability, and…
List of VMware software included in EVALExperience, as of October 2017. There have been many enhancements to this invaluable $200-a-year EVALExperience program lately, including the additions of vSAN 6.6 / NSX 6.3.1 and vRealize Automation Enterprise. Don't forget that your $20 discount is still…
Looking to ignore release notes and disclaimers/warnings to get right to the downloads and detailed upgrade procedures? There's no big fix or issue we're trying to resolve here, but if you're still in a hurry to try anyway, jump below. Here's the current Supermicro Xeon D-1500 systems with X10SDV…
I realize a vast majority of my readers can't make it to VMworld: Meet me at the VMworld 2017 US PEX and HCI Zone booths, or at the TinkerTry Virtualization Hardware Discussion Zone in the VMTN Community Blogger area Tue. Aug. 29 11am-2pm Aug 17 2017 This video helps you feel a little like you…
There was a little-discussed and finally mature capability that arrived with VMware ESXi 6.5, back in November of 2016. With last month's release of ESXi 6.5 Update 1, it's only gotten easier to configure your ESXi server to allow you to pass a single NVMe storage device, such as an Intel Optane…
Turns out the question of what backup solution to use to protect a home lab's VMs in a home lab comes up a lot here at TinkerTry, especially when a major new release of vSphere arrives on the scene. It's become such an important thing to consider for IT Pros working off the NFR code…
Disclosure This SSD is on a temporary loan from Intel, and it appears to be an engineering sample, in the 375GB size that is planned for product launch. This loaner was made with no formal expectations or stipulations, just a brief chance to TinkerTry this datacenter technology in my own VMware…
Keeping this one short-and-simple, to really encourage you to visit the source article to read through details and tips found at: New ESXCLI Commands in vSphere 6.5 Nov 19 2016 by Florian Grehl at Virten.net If you're wondering if your NVMe drive might need a firmware update, and you're running…
On a closely related note, see also: VMUG Advantage just added the latest NSX 6.3.1 and All Flash vSAN 6.6 bits to EVALExperience, great for vSphere home labs, just $200 a year! May 01 2017 vSphere 6.5 Update 1 No word yet on when VMUGAdvantage EVALExperience downloads will offer last week's big…
Looking to ignore release notes and disclaimers/warnings to get right to the downloads and detailed upgrade procedures, even though I haven't tested them yet? There's no big fix or issue we're trying to resolve here, but if you're still in a hurry to try anyway, jump below. Here's the current…
In case you were wondering who makes Intel Xeon D based systems, wonder no more! Supermicro still has the most SKUs, but wow, what a diverse product line has sprung up in the roughly 15 months since the 4 to 16 core Xeon D variants began to ship in volume, joining the original 8 core Xeon D-1540.…
If you've read TinkerTry for a while, you'll know I've enjoyed relying on Veeam Endpoint Backup FREE, right through version 1.5, to protect multiple physical PCs in my family. Several times a year, I'll do a full restore of important PCs to a VM, to be absolutely sure my backups are good.…
This article is a work in progress, more photos to be added soon. That's a lot of hi-res pics, glad I have KeyCDN ready for you! Had a great time at VeeamON 2017 in New Orleans, meeting many virtualization experts and bloggers for the first time. Oh, and I learned stuff too! There were also so many…
Looking to ignore release notes and disclaimers/warnings to get right to the downloads and detailed upgrade procedures? Jump below. I've now TinkerTry'd both of these releases. Preliminary, they seem to work well with my ESXi 6.5.0d, and my Samsung 960 EVO M.2 NVMe 1TB and Samsung 960 PRO M.2 NVMe…
I've been a big fan of the EVALExperience offering from the good folks at the VMware User Group organization for years. It's just one of the many benefits of subscribing to VMUG Advantage, and is worth far more than the $200 it costs online, or $180 at your friendly neighborhood VMUG UserCon, as…
You can free up tons of vertical real-estate when doing your day-to-day vSphere sysadmin by hiding the URLs and tabs and dead space in Chrome, see: VMware vSphere Taskbar Shortcuts Unleashed - profile switcher isolated and uncluttered Chrome Browser UIs act like native Windows apps! Mar 27 2017 …
Backstory See, everything is very healthy, ESXi 6.0 or 6.5! Back during the early test period of VMware's ESXi 6.5, I had inquired with VMware about a problem I had noticed on my Supermicro SuperServer SYS-5028D-TN4T 8 Core Bundle 2, featuring Xeon D-1541. You see, with 6.0, all VMware GUIs would…
Mar 29 2017 Update - New full install/configure demo video! Those backup speeds for handling a Windows 10 Creators Update full VM backup [35GB VMDK] are pretty incredible. The VM and the backup repository are located on an M.2 NVMe SSD. Recall that VMware vSphere 6.5 was announced on Oct 18, but…
It's no secret that VMware is moving away from the Windows/C#-based vSphere Client and the Adobe Flash-based vSphere Web Client over to an HTML5/JavaScript combo that is far faster, and much more universal. These web UIs arrived in the form of the VMware Host Client (source) that's baked right in…
Veeam certainly seems to be very good at attracting talent with a penchant for highly valuable newsletters. You may recall my piece about the always-amazing Anton Gostev: There's one weekly newsletter that any VMware or Hyper-V professional will enjoy, already has 35,218 subscribers Oct 13 2015 …
Recall that VMware vSphere 6.5 was announced on Oct 18, but released on Nov 15, 2016. By November 30th, NAKIVO let us know their stance on support for 6.5: Full vSphere 6.5 support will be available in Q1 2017, however, we may have some limited support till the end of this year. information that I…
Veeam Vanguard Definition: At VMware's Tech Summit in Las Vegas's fake Venice, Feb 01 2017. Happened to have an appropriate shirt for hunting down fellow Vanguard John Nicholson. These individuals have been nominated as Veeam Vanguards. A Veeam Vanguard represents our brand to the highest level in…
This article is a starting point for you, the proud Supermicro Superserver Xeon D system owner! For virtualization enthusiasts with a SuperServer Xeon D This article will help you enjoy an even smoother ownership experience. VMware ESXi 6.5 runs well on Xeon D Supermicro ServerServers, here's what…
SDDC - Software-Defined Datacenter. Source. Zack Widing, Federal Sr. Systems Engineer at VMware. When the picture above first emerged on Twitter back on December 6th, my reaction was a mix of wonder and joy, with a touch of jelly. This Zack Widing @zCloudtech has taken the Xeon D platform and run…
TinkerTry - Sensible datacenter
technology in the IT Pro's home. My opinions here, not my employer's.
Paul Braren, VCP 2.5/3/4/5, vExpert 2014/15/16/17, vExpert vSAN 2017.
Veeam Vanguard 2015/16/17.
Patronage | SuperServer Order Page
Detailed Intel Xeon D and NUC specs at: TinkerTry.com/compare
