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IT_Architect
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ESXi <= v4.1 for use as a tech support hub

Situation:  I'm currently using ESXi for a couple web server boxes running FreeBSD 7.2 64 VMs.  I have a Windows 2003 Server Standard VMs on each to server doing NFS, scheduled backups, and VMWare client hosts.  I log into the Windows servers using RDP, which works fine for my purposes.  I also have VMWare Desktop on my laptop.  People call me with support questions about different operating systems.  To be productive, you need to be able to work in the same environment as the customer.  That translates into having a copy of each of those operating systems.  One method would be to buy a high-powered laptop for my VMWare Desktop, and set up VMs on it, but then only I would have access to them, and they would be unavailable when I take my laptop on a call.  Another would be a slightly used, high powered server, with more processor power and RAM, for less money than I would pay for a good laptop, add ESXi and put the VMs there.  The server VMs would still be available when I leave with my laptop, and I could share those operating systems with another person helping me give support.  I could be connected to SBS 2008, while they are connected to a Windows 7 Professional.  Windows 7 and Vista run a video card pretty hard, but nobody will be watching movies on these VMs.  They just need to function RDP about as well as my SBS 2003 servers do today.  What are your thoughts?

Thanks!

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mcowger
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I run a number of Win7 VMs and its fine.  I also built a similar system for a previous employer (at a much larger scale) that worked great.

--Matt VCDX #52 blog.cowger.us

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Dave_Mishchenko
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Sounds like you already have it figured out. Smiley Happy  I use both and have Workstation on my laptop, but as soon as my laptop leaves the network so do the VMs. So it's not ideal for sharing. 

IT_Architect
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I use both and have Workstation on my laptop, but as soon as my laptop  leaves the network so do the VMs. So it's not ideal for sharing.

So you are running Windows 7 or Vista VMs on ESXi, and it works fine?

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mcowger
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I run a number of Win7 VMs and its fine.  I also built a similar system for a previous employer (at a much larger scale) that worked great.

--Matt VCDX #52 blog.cowger.us
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IT_Architect
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I run a number of Win7 VMs and its fine.

That's decision material.  I can work with that.  Thanks Tons!

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Dave_Mishchenko
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No problems with Win7/Vista besides this video driver issue - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1011709.

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No problems with Win7/Vista besides this video driver issue - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1011709.

There we go.  That's the type of thing I was hoping to flush out in this thread.  Video and HID are usually where the problems are with ESXi-type virtualization, and both Vista and Windows 7 are hard to handle in that regard.

Thanks TONS!

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wdroush1
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IT_Architect wrote:

No problems with Win7/Vista besides this video driver issue - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1011709.

There we go.  That's the type of thing I was hoping to flush out in this thread.  Video and HID are usually where the problems are with ESXi-type virtualization, and both Vista and Windows 7 are hard to handle in that regard.

Thanks TONS!

And to be honest if you're using terminal services and not VNC you won't notice it anyway.


However, yeah, best practice is to always fix the driver.

We're deploying this kind of setup for our dev environment: our software auto-deploys to various VMs so we can make sure it runs fine.

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