Every Thursday EMC puts on great webcasts dedicated to virtualization. This months installment includes a great customer reference discussing their adoption of desktop virtualization in the health care vertical. Be sure to keep an eye out as my webcast will be coming in February where I discuss EMC/VMware integration with some very cool and easy to use plug-ins.

Deploying Virtual Desktop Infrastructure to Accelerate EHR Adoption
Thursday, January 13, 2011 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Hear Columbia Memorial Hospital discuss how the EMC Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Solution for Healthcare helps solve the challenge of ever-increasing costs–while increasing clinical productivity, improving workflow, and securing patient information.

Automate Unified Recovery of VMware Hosts
Thursday, January 20, 2011 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Learn about strategies for protecting data within a unified storage infrastructure. Discover how to define protection policies, identify protection gaps, and prove compliance, as well as instantly recover from data corruption with DVR-like rollback.

Simple, Efficient, Powerful – Optimizing Your Virtualized Applications
Thursday, January 27, 2011 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Find out how our unified storage solutions can help you utilize resources to efficiently and dynamically embrace virtualization, and boost your infrastructure performance–with a 20% guarantee.

Register for the January VMware series now

Created on January 10, 2011 by Rick Scherer

Posted under EMC, Good Reading.

This blog has 64 views and one response.

Tags: EMC, health care, vdi, virtualization, VMware, webcast

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EMC is putting on some great webcasts in December all around virtualization, consider this an early Christmas present! Join some of the biggest names in the industry for two hot discussion on desktop virtualization, then join the VP of VMware Alliances, Chad Sakac, for “Chad’s Choice” – an off the cuff discussion of whats new and whats hot in virtualization technology today.

You’re not going to want to miss any of these hot topics, so be sure to register for these great events today.

How to Accelerate Desktop Virtualization in the Enterprise
Thursday, December 2, 2010 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Find out how you can gain control over existing chaotic and complex client computing infrastructures, while improving desktop security.

Best Practices for Deploying Desktop Virtualization
Thursday, December 9, 2010 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Learn how organizations have successfully implemented desktop virtualization to create a more efficient environment and discover the benefits they have experienced.

Chad’s Choice – Virtually Any Virtualization Topic!
Thursday, December 16, 2010 – 8 am PT / 11 am ET / 16:00 GMT
Learn about the latest virtualization topics from Chad Sakac, VP VMware Technology Alliance, EMC. Get key updates on new technologies, hear honest answers to your most demanding questions, and see intriguing technical demos.

Register for the December VMware series now

Created on November 27, 2010 by Rick Scherer

Posted under Good Reading.

This blog has 100 views and one response.

Tags: chad sakac, EMC, virtualization, VMware, webcast

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Created on November 11, 2010 by Rick Scherer

Posted under Good Reading, vSphere.

This blog has 880 views and 8 responses.

Tags: oracle, rac, support, VMware, vsphere

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Just about an hour ago VMware lifted the NDA on VMware vSphere 4.1 and made available all of the information on this latest release as well as the bits for download available to the public.

I will be covering a more in-depth review on this latest release really soon but I did want my readers to know that the bits are available for download from the VMware website.

http://downloads.vmware.com/d/info/datacenter_downloads/vmware_vsphere_4/4

The upgrade to ESX(i) 4.1 should be relatively easy by using traditional update methods such as VMware Update Manager (VUM).  However, the upgrade to vCenter Server 4.1 is more of a migration since it will only support a full 64-bit environment. Still don’t fret, a vCenter server migration is pretty simple just make sure you have a FULL backup of your vCenter Server database.

Also a little FYI….rumor has it that this will be the final build containing a full ESX install (Service Console). Today might be a good day to start planning that migration to ESXi.

Created on July 13, 2010 by Rick Scherer

Posted under vCenter, vSphere.

This blog has 1,387 views and one response.

Tags: esx, esxi, upgrade, vcenter, VMware, vsphere

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Sorry this took so long to get out, my new position at EMC has proven to be extremely demanding…which I LOVE! I love going out and evangelizing about what great things we’re doing in the virtualization space. Anyways, back to the review…

Two weeks ago (June 9th) I took the VCAP4-DCA Beta Exam at the Pearson Vue office in Anaheim, CA. The overall process was the same as taking any other VMware exam, you sign-in and verify your identity then they log you into a workstation where the exam awaits.

What’s immediately different about the DCA exam is that it is 100% lab based, no multiple choice questions on this one. Once the Vue administrator signs you into the exam you accept a few disclosures then a RDP-style connection is made with a system probably located at VMware HQ. You switch between the questions and the desktop session using a button located on the screen, you do use the same session for the entire test.

Without breaking NDA it is difficult to explain what’s covered in the exam, but I can say that you will need as much hands-on experience as you can possibly get. It covers many different areas including Installation, Firewall management, NMP management and even some of the add-ons like vShield Zones.

For the beta you get 4 hours to basically get through as much as you can,  I was able to get through about 40 of the questions. I personally haven’t heard how long the exam will be when it goes GA nor how many questions it will have but the one great thing about this exam and the entire VCAP certification is that it will definitely separate the book cramers and good exam takers from the true experienced administrators.

Created on June 25, 2010 by Rick Scherer

Posted under Certification.

This blog has 966 views and 5 responses.

Tags: beta, exam, vcap4, vcap4-dca, vcp, VMware

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EMC is running a webcast hosted by Chad Sakac next Thursday and the topic should be of an interest to any VMware or Storage administrator.  If you haven’t heard about VAAI and it’s great offloading capabilities I strongly urge you to register for this webcast.

Thursday, June 24, 2010, 11:00 am ET

Host: Chad Sakac, VP VMware Technology Alliance, EMC

Register Now by Clicking Here

During this discussion, you can learn about vStorage API for Array Integration (VAAI). There are some functions that your storage system can handle more efficiently than your virtual servers and their hosts can. VAAI are a set of APIs that allows VMware vSphere to offload specific operations to the storage system improving VMware performance and freeing up resources on your virtual servers by leveraging more efficient array-based operations as an alternative to VMware host-based operations.

Join EMC Virtual Geek, Chad Sakac on June 24 to get key updates and honest answers to your most demanding questions.

Register Now by Clicking Here

Created on June 18, 2010 by Rick Scherer

Posted under EMC, Storage, vSphere.

This blog has 669 views and one response.

Tags: EMC, vaai, VMware, vsphere, vstorage

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VMware, EMC, Cisco, VCE, Intel, Acadia….whew! what does it all mean?! 

VMware, Cisco and EMC created a new marketing ploy called VCE (Virtual Compute Environment), this will provide technical innovations as well as integrated pre-sales services and support.

What is the product? vBlock.  Think of vBlock as the plug and play data-center solution, it will consist of Cisco UCS/Nexus/MDS, EMC Storage and VMware Virtualization all within a pre-designed and built rack solution – simply drop it in your data-center, plug it in and deploy virtual machines.  This is not really any different than purchasing HP Servers, NetApp Storage and VMware licenses separately. Ultimately it is the same solution, but now with a single SKU that partners will be able to sell.

I can’t say that VCE is really innovative, but it is brilliant from a business standpoint.  It will allow partners to sell a single source solution quickly and easily – no longer will VARs need to bring in multiple vendors to sell the entire design.

Click Here to Learn more about VCE from the CEO’s of Cisco, EMC and VMware.

OK, so where does Intel come into this? Well with some venture capital from Cisco, EMC and Intel a new organization called Acadia is being formed.  Acadia will bring the vCloud into the private data-center.  In a phone conversation today, Chad Sakac informed me that Acadia will provide a pay by usage solution for Enterprise users that aren’t ready for the public cloud. The solution will be completely supported and provided by Acadia and the customer will only be billed for what they use.  Pretty much a vBlock will be dropped into the customers data-center, the end-user will have a self-provisioning utility to create virtual machines and then they’ll receive a bill for actual utilization.  So no capital expense at all, your data-center now turns into a full 100% operating expense.

I didn’t plan on writing a full explanation on who/how/why. Chad Sakac covers all of these topics extremely well on his blog and I invite you to check out the following links;

VCE-An Insiders Take

VCE-Technology Innovations

VCE-Integrated Sales/Service/Support

VCE-Acadia

VCE-Partner Ecosystem

Created on November 3, 2009 by Rick Scherer

Posted under Good Reading.

This blog has 2,372 views and no responses.

Tags: acadia, cisco, EMC, vblock, vce, VMware

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It’s really that simple, sign-up for the VMware Customer Program between now and September 30th, 2009, and you will be entered into a raffle to win a MacBook!  The winner will be announced on the Customer Program web-site the week of October 5th, 2009.

The VMware® Customer Program is looking for customers who are willing to share their VMware experience with their peers. If you are interested in becoming a reference for other customers or prospects, please visit the Customer Program site for information on how to join.

VMware Customer Program Overview

The VMware Customer Program is open to all VMware customers willing to share their VMware experience with their peers. It’s easy to join. Simply fill out the registration form and you’re in! In joining, we ask you to share information about your VMware environment, and to share your best practices and experiences with other customers.

As a member, you will receive the following benefits:

• Early registration for VMworld and Lab Sessions
• Access to members-only VIP Lounge at VMworld
• Eligible for members-only contests and opportunities to win vmworld.com subscriptions (a $699 value)
• Access to other members of the program through the online community
• Reports and statistics regarding trends within the membership base
• Opportunities to raise your profile as a thought leader through media and analyst coverage

How to Join

• Complete the VMware Customer Program membership form.
• All members must be willing to accept sales reference calls. Candidates for reference requests will be selected based on the information provided in their profiles.
• Member profiles must be updated annually.

View or print the PDF program flyer.

Apply today!

Created on September 16, 2009 by Rick Scherer

Posted under VMware.

This blog has 1,968 views and no responses.

Tags: customer program, macbook, VMware

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If you haven’t already, go check out the new VMware Download Center.  This new website makes it a lot easier to find the product download you’re looking for. Also be sure to look for the new VMware logo on the upper left portion of the website!

Created on September 16, 2009 by Rick Scherer

Posted under VMware.

This blog has 2,203 views and one response.

Tags: download, VMware

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Get ready for a new VMware logo, this logo will shed the infamous “3 Boxes” and also include a slight typographical change which in my opinion is a little easier on the eyes.

VMware will start rolling this new logo out in a phase approach to keep costs down, however those of you at VMworld 2009 have already started to see this new logo pop up!

For comparison, here is what the old logo looked like. I wonder when we’ll start seeing new icons!?

Thanks to Eric Gray for posting the new logo, I couldn’t find it anywhere!

Created on September 8, 2009 by Rick Scherer

Posted under VMware.

This blog has 5,011 views and 7 responses.

Tags: icon, logo, VMware, VMworld

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