Virtualization Infrastructure Overview

 

  • Virtualization explained
  • How VMware virtualization compares to traditional PC deployments
  • Common pain points in PC Server management
  • How virtualization effectively addresses common IT issues
  • VMware vSphere software products

 

How to Install, Configure ESXi 5.5 Installable

 

  • Understanding ESXi
  • Selecting, validating and preparing your server
  • Storage controllers, disks and partitions
  • Software installation and best practices
  • Joining ESXi to a Domain
  • First look at the VMware vSphere Client

 

 Virtual and Physical Networking

 

  • vNetwork standard and distributed virtual Switches
  • Virtual Switches, Ports and Port Groups
  • Creating VMkernel ports
  • Creating, sizing and customizing Virtual Switches

 

 NAS Shared Storage

 

  • Benefits Shared Storage offer to Virtual Infrastructure
  • Shared Storage options
  • NFS Overview
  • Configuring ESX to use NFS Shares
  • Troubleshooting NFS connections

 

Virtual Hardware and Virtual Machines

 

  • VM virtual hardware, options and limits
  • Sizing and creating a new VM
  • Assigning, modifying and removing Virtual Hardware
  • Working with a VM’s BIOS
  • VMware remote console applications
  • Installing an OS into a VM
  • Driver installation and customization

 

vCenter Server and the Next Generation Web Client

 

  • The need for Identity Source management
  • Installing and configuring the vCenter Server Appliance (vCSA)
  • Connecting to Active Directory and other identity sources
  • vCenter feature overview, components and licensing
  • Organizing vCenter’s inventory views
  • Importing ESX hosts into vCenter management
  • Installing and Using the vSphere Next Generation vSphere Client (NGC)

 

VM Rapid Deployment using Templates, Clones

 

  • Templates – Virtual Machine Golden Master images
  • Creating, modifying, updating and working with Templates
  • Patching, and refreshing Templates
  • Cloning, one time copies of VMs
  • Best practices for cloning and templating
  • Adding and resizing virtual disks

 

ESXi and vCenter Permission Model

 

  • VMware Security model
  • Configuring local users and groups
  • Managing local permissions
  • vCenter security model
  • Local, Domain and Active Directory users and groups
  • How permissions are applied

 

 Using Fiber and iSCSI Shared Storage

 

  • Fiber SAN overview
  • Identifying and using Fiber Host Bus Adapters
  • Scanning and Rescanning Fiber SANs
  • iSCSI overview
  • Virtual and physical iSCSI adapters
  • Connecting to iSCSI storage
  • Scanning and rescanning iSCSI SANS
  • Performance and redundancy considerations and best practices

 

VMware File System (VMFS)

 

  • Unique file system properties of VMFS
  • Managing shared Volumes
  • Creating new VMFS partitions
  • Managing VMFS capacity with LUN spanning and LUN expansion
  • Native and 3rd party Multipathing with Fiber and iSCSI SANs
  • VMFS performance considerations

 

Resource Management and Resource Pools

 

  • How ESX delivers resources to VMs
  • Shares, Reservations and Limits
  • CPU resource scheduling
  • Memory resource scheduling
  • Resource Pools

 

ESX and vCenter Alarms

 

  • Alarm categories and definitions
  • Creating custom alarms and actions
  • Reviewing alarms and acknowledging them

 

Host Profiles

 

  • Using Host Profiles to capture an ESXi host configuration
  • Perform configuration compliance scans
  • Remediating out of compliance configuration issues
  • Rapid ESXi host deployment/configuration with Host Profiles

 

Consolidation with vCenter Converter Standalone

 

  • vCenter Converter overview
  • Converting physical machines, virtual machines and OS Images
  • Cold migrations of physical machines to virtual machines
  • Hot migrations of physical machines to virtual machines

 

Back Up, Recovery with VMware Data Recovery

 

  • Pro’s and Cons of traditional back up strategies
  • Backing up VMs with VMware Data Recovery
  • Backing and restoring your ESXi server configuration
  • Third party VM backup solutions

 

VM Hot and Cold Migration, Storage VMotion

 

  • Cold Migrations to new ESX hosts, datastores
  • Hot Migrations with VMotion
  • VMotion requirements and dependencies
  • How VMotion works – detailed explanation
  • Troubleshooting VMotion
  • Storage VMotion for hot VM disk migrations

 

Load Balancing w. Distributed Resource Scheduler

 

  • Delegated resource management with Resource Pools
  • Resource balanced clusters with VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler
  • DRS Cluster configuration and tuning
  • Per-VM cluster policy overrides

 

Failure Recovery with High Availability Clusters

 

  • High Availability options to minimize unplanned down time
  • VMware High Availability clusters
  • VMware Fault Tolerance

 

Chapter 19: Patch Management with VMware Update Manager

 

  • Configure and enable VMware Update Manager
  • Establishing a patch baseline
  • Verifying compliance and patching ESXi hosts

 

VMware Replication

 

  • Establishing Time to Recovery requirements
  • Overview of SAN LUN replication and VMware Site Recovery Manager
  • Installing and configuring VMware Replication for individual VM replication
  • Replicating a VM
  • Recovering a replicated VM

 

Managing Scalability and Performance

 

  • VMkernel CPU and memory resource management mechanisms
  • Tuning VM storage I/O performance
  • Identifying and resolving resource contention
  • Monitoring VM and ESX host performance
  • Performance and capacity planning strategies

 

Final Thoughts

 

  • Consolidation guidelines for VMs and Storage
  • Determining which workloads to consolidate
  • Other considerations