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After you enabled SSH to access remotely to an ESXi host, a yellow warning (shell warning) will show up next to the host indicating that the host is vulnerable. To fix this (hide the yellow pling) Select the host and go to Configure / System / Advanced System Settings / Edit… Type “ssh” to quickly filter the search. Under [...] Read more

Using the Virtual Media function on iDRAC6, iDRAC7, iDRAC8 and iDRAC9 How to Install the Operating System on a Dell PowerEdge Server Can’t Install OS from Bootable USB Drive on Dell Poweredge [Long story short, use rear USBs and format USB stick as MBR not UFEI]

This is not really un upgrade, (although this can be done if the hardware is suitable), but rather setting up a new server, installing ESXi 8.0 and migrating existing VMs to the new box. Note that in this case there is no shared storage, due to geographical issues. It's probably a good idea to browse some of the notes before setting off. SD [...] Read more

This is easy with shared storage but how best to do it with stand alone servers using internal storage - common in SMEs? There are various ways, such as sFTP, using the VMware convertor and using ovftool. see https://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2012/06/how-to-copy-vms-directly-between-esxi.html for more details. C:Program FilesVMwareVMware OVF [...] Read more

Sometimes one of Microsoft's 'single point of failure' problems bites back, and a dead DC which was housing the 5 FSMO roles is one of the most irksome. The obvious solution is to restore a working backup, but sometimes that might not be immediately possible - dead hardware, corrupt backup, need to get it working 'right now' and so on. Assuming [...] Read more

Slightly odd one this - we had a series of issues with a client who was using a number of Dell XPS laptops, with Windows 11 and USB3 <=> Ethernet adapters based on the Realtek chipset, where the large downloads kept failing. Worked fine over Wi-Fi and with USB adapters which did not use the Realtek chipset. To test this out seriously we [...] Read more

When using any ACME client to create certificates the key thing the process must do is to ensure that the Domain - example.com - really is owned by the user creating the certificate - or the entire exercise is pointless. ACME supports various mechanisms to achieve this but the two main ones are the HTTP-01 and DNS-01 challenge. See [...] Read more

One of the great joys of Let'sEncrypt certificates for Microsoft Exchange servers is the ability to automatically renew and install them, using some form of ACME client. But things can go wrong, especially when debugging the installation process. We recently set up Let'sEncrypt for a client who was using the 2010 version of Exchange (MSX) [EoL of [...] Read more