May
02

#VDI Tip 70: Fixing the View Agent on Persistent Desktops without Recomposing

By | VDI Tips

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This is guest post from a co-worker, Brent Robin. Good find if you run into the problem.

1) Go to the vsphere vCenter where the vm is located and login to the VM via the console.

2) Login into the VM locally as administrator only.

3) Uninstall the View Agent. Reboot the VM.

4) Log back into the VM as the local Administrator and follow these directions as per this link > http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2002765

5) Disable any TP Autoconnect services associated to Thinprint.

6) Disable the antivirus scanner if applicable.

7) Install the View Agent ver that is applicable and reboot the VM.

8) Check the View Administrator console to make sure the Status shows “Available”.

9) Have user log back into their VM to ensure its stable.

Mar
12

Book Giveaway: View 5 Desktop Virtualization Solutions

By | Featured, Virtualization, VMware View

26 Comments

Thanks for coming to my End User Computing Blog. I appericate the support and any feed back you can give. To say thank you to the community, I will be giving away the new VMware View 5 Desktop Virtualization Solutions by Jason Langone & Andre Leibovici. The winner will get the Print + eBook bundle.

Just a leave a comment related to VDI. Could be that your looking at implementing VDI , you love it, how you use it, anything! I’ll take the names and put them into a hat and let one of my daugthers pick it out of a hat(very scientific). The contest is open to the UK, US, Europe and selected countries in Asia(due to shipping) and will close once the book is GA.

    This book is a complete guide to planning and designing a solution based on VMware View 5
    Secure your Visual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) by having firewalls, antivirus, virtual enclaves, USB redirection and filtering and smart card authentication
    Analyze the strategies and techniques used to migrate a user population from a physical desktop environment to a virtual desktop solution
    A learn-by-example based approach that focuses on key concepts to provide the foundation to solve real world problems

Mar
11

Over a Year and 60 + VDI Tips Later

By | VDI Tips, Virtualization

2 Comments

It has been over a year now of blogging on ITBLOODPRESSURE.com and it’s a been lot of fun. I just started off doing VDI tips on twitter but found I could provide more value through a blog. I am happy to contribute to a wonderful community as I have been on the receiving end many times. Below are my Top 5 since the blog has been up and running. The list is based on what I like, not on how many hits I have received.

The Best VMware View PowerShell Variable – Tell them to Reboot

#VDI Tip 52: Rat A Dat Dat, better Thin Dat (Picked because of the Title)

Get Your VMware View Health Check Sent To Your Inbox

No Desktops, Big Problems

#VDI Tip 58: Backup All Of Your Components At The Same Time

Mar
08

#VDI Tip 65 – Repeat After Me – Tools and then the Agent

By | Featured, VDI Tips

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Anytime you upgrade the VMware tools on your VDI image you need to reinstall the View agent again. The tools can replace the VGA driver and end up causing blurriness, disconnects or no connection at all. I found a nice table at the Teradici website and in a VMware KB that you can reference.

　

Windows XP

Windows Vista

Windows 7

View 3.1.3 build 252693
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.0.35
Dated: 4/21/2010
VMware SVGA 3D
Version: 17.14.1.42
Dated: 4/21/2010

Not Supported

View 4.0.2 build 294291
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.35
Dated: 4/21/2010
 　

Not Supported

View 4.5.0 build 293049
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.37
Dated: 7/16/2010
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.37
Dated: 7/16/2010
VMware SVGA 3D
Version: 7.14.1.49
Dated: 7/16/2010

View 4.6.0 build 366101
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.0.37
Dated: 7/16/2010
VMware SVGA II
Version: 11.6.0.37
Dated: 7/16/2010
VMware SVGA 3D
Version: 7.14.1.49
Dated: 7/16/2010
View 5.0 build 481677 VMware SVGA II
Version 11.7.5.0
Date: 7/12/2011		 VMware SVGAII
Version: 11.7.5.0
Dated: 7/12/2011		 VMware SVGA 3D
Version 7.14.1.1061
Date: 7/29/2011

VMware KB: The PCoIP server log reports the error: Error attaching to SVGADevTap, error 4000

Mar
07

VDI-IOmark – VDI Storage Benchmarking For People With A Schedule

By | BriForum, Virtualization, VMware View

1 Comment

Translating Max IOPS into how many users you can fit onto a storage array(s) can be a pretty complicated question to ask of someone. Workloads are random between users, different blocks sizes are hitting the storage, AV is getting in the way and the list goes on and on. 20 IOPS per user is big joke in the VDI space. While 20 IOPS may represent the average, the deviation from that number can be astonishing. I encourage you watch Applied Math for VDI Design: A Statistical Approach to Designing VDI Environments. The session was presented at BriFourm last year and now is free. If you watch the video, you will see and understand what you need to be planning for.

VDI-IOmark from Evaluator Group is a tool that can tests your storage subsystem with realistic workloads. IOmeter can only give you simulated IO and not all the crazy behaviors of actual workload. VDI-IOmark uses workload replay from previous work captured from VMware RAWC implementation(View Planner). VDI-IOmark has 64 unique replays. The workloads range from 5 IOPS -20 IOPS on average but have peaks over 100. Microsoft Office(Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook), Internet Explorer, 7zip and Windows Media Player were all used to creat the replay. Boot and steady were also included in the replay. The tests are not dependent on your server platform, switching fabric or storage protocol so that’s a big thumbs up but it doesn need to run on .

The great thing about VDI-IO mark it that requires less the time to configure than building out a full environment. This is great if want to repurpose some old storage and test it our prior too or if you’re a consultant, you can do apple to apple comparisons between different vendors. Also since is each replay file contains 8 workloads test you can test your storage subsystem will less server hardware, you don’t need all the RAM it would normally take in a traditional LoginVSI or View Planner test. It’s always hard to get more money for test gear but people always want to know what the expensive box can do in the datacenter.
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