vSphere Test Environment Setup

[THADC]

Hello,

As part of my effort to gain my vcp5 certification, I am starting to set up a vSphere test environment. I will be using a 60 day eval for the vSphere 5 install.

The Blueprint says the following:

If you have the equipment to install a copy of ESXi 5.x, you can install ESXi in a VM. This would allow you to install multiple copies of ESXi and a copy of vCenter Server.

Is this to say I need to install some base VMWare component (not sure what that would be) before I install anything else, and then I install one or more instance of ESXi and a copy of vCenter in a single VM within that base component?

If I am sounding a little naive, please be gentle. I'm a smart guy and will come around

Thanks for any response!

[a_p_]

A lot of people - including me - run a virtualized test environment on a PC with VMware Workstation 8.0. Provided the PC has the appropriate hardware like 64-bit CPU, Intel-VT support (in case of an Intel CPU), a minimum of 4GB RAM and some disk space you can setup a test environment without spending a lot of money.

André

[NickMarshall9]

Hi Thadc,

First of all welcome to the community!

I started writing some guides on how to build a "home lab" for VCP5 study, using VMware Workstation as A.P mentioned which can be found here:

http://www.virtualnetworkdesign.com/vcp5_lab_guides/vcp5-lab1/

There's some placeholders for future labs, but install VMware Worksation as a trail, and follow this guide. It should get you well on the way to that coverted VCP5 cert!

Cheers,

[THADC]

Hi Nick, thanks so much for this information. I have started setting up my home lab, as per your guide.

Excellent service you are providing.

At this point, I have install the Workstation 8 and created the Virtual Host VM (the one you call VND-Core-Host).

I had couple of glitches with ESXi 5 install:

After the VM was created, Workstation 8 automatically started booting the VM and creating the ESXi 5 Installation. In other words, I did not have the opportunity to edit the VM to enable “Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT or AMD-V/RVI” under the CPU options. I wasn't sure of the implications of this..

In any event, the boot process seemed to work as per your steps captured in your screenshots, until it got to a point where it gave me the following warning:

"<HARDWARE_VITUALIZATION WARNING: Hardware Virtualization is not a feature of the CPU, or is not enabled in the BIOS>".

I continued with the installation to completion anyway. It said the install was successful, and it automatically rebooted as per your instructions.

At this point, I shut it down so that I could edit the VM to enable “Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT or AMD-V/RVI”.

I did this, but upon restarting, I got the following message/error/warning (see attachment).

I suspecrt my install is not correct because of this issue. Any ideas of what to do?

Thanks for any response and enjoy your afternoon, Tim

[NickMarshall9]

Hi,

Yeah, I'm aware there's a few issues with the instructions. I need to tighten that up. Thanks for the heads up.

Regarding your error message, you have all the correct settings on your virtual environment but it looks like the CPU features that help with virtualization are not available on your physical desktop / laptop. This could be because of two reasons:

1) Your CPU is too old and does not support these features

or

2) Your CPU is new enough, but the features are disabled in your BIOS.

If the former, there's not much you can do regarding a nested virtualized environment

If the later, then you can enable these features when rebooting your computer. See this post for details:

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1829847

Let me know if you can't get it working, and the specs of your machine and I'll try to get you some more specific instructions.

Cheers,

[THADC]

Thanks. My Intel Dual Core Duo did not support the virtualization. I ended up borrowing another machine with a quad core AMD that has the AMD-V virtualization.  Once I enable the AMD-V in the BIOS, and created the ESXi 5 installation, it seemed to come up without a hiccup.

However, I am a little confused about how to proceed.

If I understand what I have done from your instructions, I have the Base Install ESXi 5 (which used the ESXi 5 iso file as per your step c in the wizard install). However, how is the secondary ESXi 5 (the one that goes inside the base ESXi 5) installed? Is that what happened when I performed the “Standard Installer” from the Boot Menu (the screen shot below your 1.2 ESXi 5 Installation section)? Or have I yet to perform that install?

An how about the ESXi 4? If I have the Base ESXi 5 and the second ESXi 5 installed, how do I proceed to install the ESXi 4? You don't have any steps for that or the OpenFiler.

Any reply is appreciated, and thanks so far!

Tim