Tuesday, August 31, 2010

ESXi 4.1 Unable to install / upgrade VMware Tools on Guest OS

Recently I was trying to upgrade vmware tools on a windows 2008 guest and I got an error

"Unable to install VMware Tools. An error occurred while trying to access image file "/usr/lib/vmware/isoimages/windows.iso" needed to install VMware Tools: 2 (No such file or directory). If your product shipped with the VMware Tools package, reinstall VMware ESX, then try again to install the VMware Tools package in the virtual machine.   The required VMware Tools ISO image does not exist or is inaccessible."

Further investigation through remote tech support into the ESXi host I found that the iso image is missing from the directory and the directory is 100% full, which must be the reason for not installing the tool images. I found that old tool images are not removed from the system and as a result while upgrading , its not able to copy the new images due to file system full.

I guess this issue is due to a upgrade from esxi4 u1 to esxi4.1. Somehow the upgrade didnt went well or some other issue. But the ESXi server is up and running and hosting more than 100 vms. I dont want to reinstall the ESXi on the host. ESXi 4.1 comes with resmote tech support , no need to go through unsupported way anymore

I fix the issue by copying the image file from a working ESXi4.1 server.

1) Start the remote tech support (SSH), Click on the ESXi host on the left panel, go to configuration ,
on the software section click on Security profile, Click properties on the right top corner, click remote
tech support and click option and start the ssh.












2) Use putty to ssh into the ESXi host and delete the old images files from the below location

/vmfs/volumes/e00f98e1-2bcc0c91-e7a2-3487611c1557/packages/4.0.0/vmtools

3) Using winscp to copy files to the ESXi host location, provided you already copy the image files from a working ESXi 4.1 server to the laptop/desktop. Copy to below location:

/vmfs/volumes/e00f98e1-2bcc0c91-e7a2-3487611c1557/packages/4.1.0/vmtools.

4) Copy the  .iso, .sig and tools-key.pub. files, because all these files required if you want to upgrade the vmware tools.

Thats its close the winscp, putty and Dont forget to stop the remore tech support(SSH). Now right click on the VM ->guest -> Install/upgrade  vmware tools.


There is another way where you can copy the iso image (windows.iso) to the local datastore and mount the iso image and start the installation. This you have to mount and umount the iso image each time for every VMs. If you have only few VMs this will be easy way but tedious for 100 VMs.

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Unable to obtain hardware information for the selected machine - vCenter converter error

I was moving an RHEL6 64 bit VM to another host through vCenter converted standalone 4.0.1 build 161434 and I got the following error " Unable to obtain hardware information for the selected machine " .














I figure it out that the issue is due to the Guest Operating System version. RHEL 6 version is not supported with vConverter. The workaround is to edit the vm settings, change the GOS version to RHEL5  and move the machine. Once its moved , before powering on, change the version back to original version.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

How to remove Netapp VSC 1.0 plugin / uninstalling VSC 1.0 plugin

I was installing Netapp VSC 2.0 (Virtual Storage Console) on my vCenter server, while installing it asked me to uninstall the old version of VSC and RCU from the vCenter server. I went to the control panel and uninstall the program manually. After uninstalling VSC, I found that the plug-in is not removed. (vSphere client-manage plug-in) see the snapshot below











I dont know why its not removed, I found a way to remove the plug-in through Managed object browser.
1) Go to the browser and type the address of your vCenter server like below and it will open the mob window for you. Once the window is open , on the properties table click on the content
     https://vcenterserver/mob











( Click on the content link)


2) Next window on the properties table  click on the Extension Manager












3) On the next screen , properties table, check for the netapp extension (com.netapp.exoforce)



4) Click on the extension list and look at the properties table and copy the key string ( com.netapp.exoforce)











5) Once copied the string , go back on the browser window(previous page) and look for unregister Extension on the Methods table.












6) On the next screen , paste the copied string and click invoke Method , you will get the status as " Method Invocation Result: void ".













7) Thats it , close the window and log into vSphere Client. If you already logged in , log out and log back







The plug-in is removed and now you can proceed to install the VSC 2.0. This not a mandatory for installing VSC 2.0, but I like the plug-in manager to look clean. that's why..