Moments after Erik posted about vCenter vs VDI,  I got problems with the VMware View 3.1.1 environment I’m setting up. I wanted to adjust the quality settings of Adobe Flash in a certain desktop pool. I started to edit the settings for the desktop pool and when I clicked finish I got a error that the Virtual Center didn’t had Sysprep running!!!

So I change a settings about the quality for Adobe Flash and suddenly Sysprep is broken?

The suggestion made to resolving this error was to set the customization specification to “none”. Since I used the desktop pool in question for almost 2 days now with the specified customization, I wasn’t about to put that option to “none”.

Things I tried to resolve the problem where:

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It sounds a bit strange, ‘vCenter vs VDI‘, as both are VMware products but it’s true. As usual a twitter contact pointed me to a VMware KB article which states the following.

‘VirtualCenter tasks that conflict with VMware Virtual Desktop functionality‘

My first thought was ‘Ah finally, an explanation why vSphere 4 has no support for VMware View 3‘. But when I looked at the affected product versions it appeared that this was not the case.

The VMware KB article provides a list of VirtualCenter 2.5.x actions that conflict with VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure functionality (Virtual Desktop Manager 2.x and View 3.x) and cause VDI Desktops to become inaccessible. These action are:

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Today Virtualization.info published the news that VMware View 4.0 went into private beta with the Teradici PCoIP software implementation. I was unable to verify this but I assume it’s correct.

So why am I so excited about the upcoming version?
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In the last week these items are added or edited in VMware’s Knowledgebase at http://kb.vmware.com

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Scouting the Internet on information about the new G6 evolution of HP servers I ran into a valuable article from Martijn Lohmeijer’s blog.

In a lessons learned article he warns about the new memory management in the new HP ProLiant DL360/380 G6.

We all know what happens when new hardware is delivered (at least I do). Techies as we are, we start unpacking the servers, flip the cover and inspect the new Intel Nehalem CPUs, fiber channel HBAs and SSDs murmuring about GHzs, GB, IOPS and FSBs with some additional ‘oh’, ‘ah’ and ‘cools’. Then put in the memory, disks and other toys we ordered and rush it to the server room or test area, plug it in, install an operating system or hypervisor. We then find out that the server is not performing as expected and start screwing up BIOS settings and pulling out components.

All you should have done after unpacking your new present is reading the manual and the quick specs of the server (which we (as techies (and men) never do).

The following is a enumeration of the most important items from the quick specs of the HP ProLiant DL360 G6.

DDR3 memory population guidelines

Some DIMM installation guidelines are summarized below:

• DIMM slots that are white should be populated first
• Do not mix Unbuffered memory (UDIMMs) with Registered memory (RDIMMs)
• If only one processor is installed in a 2CPU system, only half of the DIMM slots are available
• Do not install DIMMs if the corresponding processor is not installed
• To maximize performance, balance the total memory capacity between all installed processors
• You can only install two quad-rank DIMMs per channel
• You can only install two UDIMMs per channel; if available, the third slot in the channel must remain empty

A full list can be found in Martijn’s article or on the HP website.