Enable and configure SNMP in vSphere 6 (ESXi)

Get command line access with SSH or ESXi Console as user root. Then run the following commands to enable SNMP and configure SNMP v2 community, SysLocation and SysContact. esxcli system snmp set -r esxcli system snmp set -c esxsnmpusr esxcli system snmp set -p 161 esxcli system snmp set -L “California, USA” esxcli system snmp … Read more

Cisco Nexus 1000v Standalone VSM upgrade to Release 4.2(1) SV1(4)

Cisco Nexus team released the update to the Nexus 1000v product taking it to release 4.2(1) SV1(4). They did a great job of documenting the entire upgrade process both in docs and in a series of screencasts. Check it out it’s really worth your time.

However one obvious thing that they have missed so far is how to upgrade if your VSM is in standalone mode. Part of the problem is the Upgrade application (GUI) does not support standalone mode and the upgrade document does not address the manual upgrade (CLI) method for standalone VSM.

Here is a quick guide on how to upgrade your standalone VSM from 4.0(4) SV1(3, 3a, or 3b) to 4.2(1) SV1(4).

Before you start make sure you have run the pre-upgrade check script against your 1000v configuration to make sure you don’t run into the 7 configurations that are incompatible with Nexus 4.0.x to 4.2.x code.

Now the actual steps:

Step 0 Do a show mod and make sure you have already upgraded all the VEM modules. Remember this has changed from earlier releases. You HAVE to upgrade the VEM first and VSM second to upgrade to release 4.2(1) SV1(4).

show mod
Mod  Ports  Module-Type                       Model               Status
---  -----  --------------------------------  ------------------  ------------
1    0      Virtual Supervisor Module         Nexus1000V          active *
3    248    Virtual Ethernet Module           NA                  ok
4    248    Virtual Ethernet Module           NA                  ok
5    248    Virtual Ethernet Module           NA                  ok
6    248    Virtual Ethernet Module           NA                  ok

Mod  Sw                Hw
---  ----------------  ------------------------------------------------
1    4.0(4)SV1(3b)      0.0
3    4.2(1)SV1(4)      VMware ESXi 4.1.0 Releasebuild-320137 (2.0)
4    4.2(1)SV1(4)      VMware ESXi 4.1.0 Releasebuild-320137 (2.0)
5    4.2(1)SV1(4)      VMware ESXi 4.1.0 Releasebuild-320137 (2.0)
6    4.2(1)SV1(4)      VMware ESXi 4.1.0 Releasebuild-320137 (2.0)

Mod  MAC-Address(es)                         Serial-Num
---  --------------------------------------  ----------
1    00-19-07-6c-5a-a8 to 00-19-07-6c-62-a8  NA
3    02-00-0c-00-03-00 to 02-00-0c-00-03-80  NA
4    02-00-0c-00-04-00 to 02-00-0c-00-04-80  NA
5    02-00-0c-00-05-00 to 02-00-0c-00-05-80  NA
6    02-00-0c-00-06-00 to 02-00-0c-00-06-80  NA

Mod  Server-IP        Server-UUID                           Server-Name
---  ---------------  ------------------------------------  --------------------
1    172.16.165.55    NA                                    NA
3    172.16.165.91    dcedbaac-1dc0-11df-0000-00000000000e  172.16.165.91
4    172.16.165.92    dcedbaac-1dc0-11df-0000-00000000000d  172.16.165.92
5    172.16.165.93    dcedbaac-1dc0-11df-0000-00000000000c  172.16.165.93
6    172.16.165.94    dcedbaac-1dc0-11df-0000-00000000000b  172.16.165.94

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PXE boot VMware ESXi 4.1 and Manual Install

an awesome new feature in the just released ESXi 4.1 is the ability to do PXE boot and script the install using a kick-start script. If you looking for information on how to do this see here at billhill’s post.

http://communities.vmware.com/blogs/vmwareinsmb/2010/07/13/esxi-41-scripted-installation-via-pxe-and-kickstart

However while adding that feature VMware seems have slightly broken the PXE boot, but manual install ability of ESXi. This is useful if you have lights-out lab and want to use the local pxe server instead of those virtual media options but also want to customize the install options as the lab servers do not have standardized components and hardware and may other issues.

Refer to the above link for overall PXE/dhcp/tftp install steps. I plan only to document what’s different for a manual install.

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