Serendipity - A Fortunate Accident

16Sep2005
Uploaded by fun_come

No interfaces are available for installing a new cluster

User was trying to setup Microsoft NLB. They added one node and it was successful and when they were trying to add another node it was throwing error

“No interfaces are available for installing a new cluster”

User pointed out that may the VLAN trunking which was implemented couple of weeks back. I was not sure what VLAN has to do with it but when I looked at the error I made a guess that it has something to do with OS rather than VMware. I went to MS support site and gave a search with the error message and found wonderful KB 828258.

………….SNIP …………………………………..SNIP…………………………………

This problem may occur if the subsequent nodes are on servers that were created by using an image. The problem occurs because the servers that are created by using an image may have the same Network GUIDs in their registry if the network adapter is installed as part of the image. The Network Load Balancing Manager uses this GUID to attach and configure Network Load Balancing on the servers. The Network Load Balancing Manager detects the GUID of the first server, and then does not register subsequent network adapters that have the same GUID.

-------------------SNIP………………………………………SNIP………………………………..

It was true because these VM’s was build with “GHOST image”

To resolve this follow these steps in the same sequence

1. Uninstall the tools from the VM’s using add and remove program.

2. Uninstall the network adapter from device manager.

3. Reboot the machine.

4. Login to the machine locally and then setup the network again reboot the VM’s

5. Install the tools and then reboot the VM’s

These steps have to be repeated for all the nodes which will be involved in NLB.

Once this is completed then NLB will be configured without any error.

How to create new "VMDK" desciptor file

Strange issue with the VMDK descriptor file.

One the virtual machine was registered and powered on , but for some reason “vmx” file was missing. I thought I would create a “vmx” file using wizard. I unregistered the “VM” and then tried to create the “vmx” file using wizard. VM was got created but was not able to attached the disk file because “vmdk” descriptor file was missing. “Peewe” how the heck I should create the descriptor file .

1. Tried using other descriptor file from other VM’s and removed the line something like this

RW 419430400 VMFS “rescue_me-flat.vmdk”

This did not work out because the other information like may not be correct.

ddb.virtualHWVersion = “4″
ddb.geometry.cylinders = “26108″
ddb.geometry.heads = “255″
ddb.geometry.sectors = “63″
ddb.adapterType = “lsilogic”
ddb.toolsVersion = “7201″

I was not surprised with this. So I thought lets create a exact same size disk on some other host and copy over the descriptor file from that host to current host (Because current was not having enough space to create the new disk file).

This also did not work because I guess information is so encrypted that I was not able to find out what need to change. So how did I fix it?

1. Power off some other VM’s (In order to free up some space).

2. Once I have enough space create a new disk with same EXACT SIZE using the wizard at the same location where we are trying to create a descriptor file

(This step is very important I wasted my 2 hour to just figure this out)

3. Now remove the newly created disk from the VM.

4. Unregister the VM from the host.

5. Copy the newly created “vmdk” file with the old name (For which we are trying to generate descriptor file).

6. Edit the renamed “vmdk ” file and make sure the entry is pointing to correct flat file

E.g:

# Extent description
RW 419430400 VMFS “rescue_me-flat.vmdk”

7. Once the above steps are done then edit the vmx file and search for the line

E.G

scsi0:0.fileName = " rescue_me-flat.vmdk "

8. Once all the above steps are done then re-register the file using following

Vmware-cmd –s register <path to vmx file>

I would like to thank Paul Shannon for his wonderful blog which really helped me to achieve what I wanted.

Happy B'Day Sweetheart

Happy Birday Sweetheart. As we call you Vibha, Sonuva, Zonki,Gudiya,Chonputuk,Sonpari
We have started preparing for your arrival by seeking blessing from Almighty. Your mom was bit tensed before your arrival but I was sure that we are going to make it with the help of Almighty. Doctor “Carmela A Barr” and her team prepared the bed for your arrival. You were under surveillance to make sure that you are also prepared to join our family. On September 8th 2007 around 10.05 PM you finally arrived in this world and into our family. Every one visited to see my princes ,Rishi, Madhu, Saumitra. But much awaited was Great Grand Mother .She came on 17th September. You were bit late in getting her blessing but she always had her blessing before you came into this world. Finally everyone wanted to leave me alone and on Nov 18th you left for India. When you were 4 days old you gave a first pose and your mom was able to capture it. After looking at the pose we started thinking that you are going to be a great thinker? You started growing like a beautiful princes and then the first word came out of your mouth was “Dada” a great grandfather (Mr. Vishnu Narayan Roy ) of yours . You are always happy to be with your Grand Mother.





FERRERO COLLECTION

Memory spikes and Reservation

Here is the host configuration

One of the users complains about memory spikes messages that they are getting from the system.

Available Ram is 170988.0 KB for xxxxxxxx . Please take appropriate action.

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I ran spotlight (My Fav. freeware tool from Quest Control) on those machine and found the spikes (Check spike before 11.35AM)

I went to the VC and selected the VM’s properties and set the memory reservation to and the memory utilization on virtual machine changed (Check the graph pattern after 11.35AM).