Deploying Virtual Machines Flashcards
What are some ways to create VMs?
use the new virtual machine wizard
deploy VMs from existing templates or clones
*not available when deploying VMs from the VMware Host Client
deploy VMs from OVF templates
List the steps to deploy a VM.
1) select creation type
- create a new virtual machine
- deploy from template
- clone an existing VM
- clone VM to template
- convert template to VM
- clone template to template
2) select name and folder
3) select compute resource
- select which ESXi host VM will be deployed on
4 select storage
- datastore on which VMs files will be stored
5) select compatibility
- select which version of ESXi the VM will be compatible with
6) select guest OS
7) customize hardware
- CPU
- memory
- hard disk size
- ISO image containing guest OS installation files
What are VMware Tools?
VMware Tools is a set of features that enhance the performance of a VM’s guest operating system.
VMware Tools improves management of the VM by replacing generic operating system drivers with VMware drivers tuned for virtual hardware. You install VMware Tools into the guest operating system.
What is an OVF Template?
OVF stands for Open Virtual Machine Format. A virtual appliance is a preconfigured VM that typically includes a preinstalled guest
operating system and other software. A virtual appliance is usually designed for a specific purpose, for example, to provide a secure web browser, a firewall, or a backup and recovery utility. Virtual appliances are deployed as OVF templates. OVF is a platform-independent, efficient, extensible, and open packaging and distribution format for VMs. OVF files are compressed, resulting in faster downloads.
How are VM files stored?
Each VM is stored either as a collection of files or objects:
- Files in a directory on a VMFS or NFS datastore
- Objects on a vSAN or vSphere Virtual Volumes datastore
Each virtual disk is encapsulated into a single file or object.
List and describe each of the VM files
.vmx vmname.vmx Virtual machine configuration file
.vmxf vmname.vmxf Additional virtual machine configuration files
.vmdk vmname.vmdk Virtual disk characteristics
-flat.vmdk vmname-flat.vmdk Virtual machine data disk
.nvram vmname.nvram or nvram Virtual machine BIOS or EFI configuration
.vmem vmname.vmem Virtual machine paging backup file
.vmsd vmname.vmsd Virtual machine snapshots information (metadata) file
.vmsn vmname.vmsn Virtual machine memory snapshot file
.vswp vmname.vswp Virtual machine swap file
.vmss vmname.vmss Virtual machine suspend file
.log vmware.log Current virtual machine log file
-#.log vmware-#.log (where # is a number starting with 1) Old virtual machine log files
Additional files are created when you perform certain tasks with the virtual machine.
A .hlog file is a log file that is used by vCenter Server to keep track of virtual machine files that must be removed after a certain operation completes.
A .vmtx file is created when you convert a virtual machine to a template. The .vmtx file replaces the virtual machine configuration file (.vmx file).
List the configuration maximums for VMs
Compute
CPUs per host - 896
Compute
Hosts per cluster - 96
Compute
Virtual CPUs per virtual machine (Virtual SMP) - 768
Memory
Memory RAM per virtual machine - 24 TB
Memory
Memory Virtual machine swap file size - 24 TB
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SCSI adapters per virtual machine - 4
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SCSI Targets Per Virtual SCSI Adapter (PVSCSI only) - 64
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SCSI Targets Per Virtual Machine (PVSCSI only) - 256
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual NVMe adapters per virtual machine - 4
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual NVMe targets per virtual NVMe adapter - 15
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual NVMe targets per virtual machine - 60
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual disk size - 62 TB
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
IDE controllers per virtual machine - 1
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
IDE devices per virtual machine - 4
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
IDE CDROM devices per virtual machine - 4
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Floppy controllers per virtual machine - 1
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Floppy devices per virtual machine - 2
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SATA adapters per virtual machine - 4
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SATA devices per virtual SATA adapter - 30
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SCSI targets per virtual SCSI adapter - 15
Storage Virtual Adapters and Devices
Virtual SCSI targets per virtual machine - 60
Networking Virtual Devices
Virtual NICs per virtual machine - 10
Networking Virtual Devices
Virtual RDMA Adapters per Virtual Machine - 1
Virtual Peripheral Ports
USB host controllers per virtual machine - 1
Virtual Peripheral Ports
USB devices connected to a virtual machine - 20
Virtual Peripheral Ports
Parallel ports per virtual machine - 3
Virtual Peripheral Ports
Serial ports per virtual machine - 32
Miscellaneous
Concurrent remote console connections to a virtual machine - 40
Storage Policies
Maximum number of virtual machine storage policies - 1024
Graphics video device
Video memory per virtual machine - 4 GB
Persistent Memory
Non-volatile memory per virtual machine - 12 TB
Persistent Memory
Number of NVDIMMs per virtual machine - 64
Persistent Memory
NVDIMM controllers per VM - 1
PCI passthrough devices
Number of PCI passthrough devices per VM - 64
Describe a Thick-Provisioned Virtual Disk.
Thick provisioning uses all the defined disk space at the creation of the virtual disk, regardless of how much disk space is actually used by the guest operating system file system.
Thick-provisioned disk types are either eager zeroed or lazy zeroed:
- In an eager-zeroed thick-provisioned disk, every block is prefilled with a zero.
- In a lazy-zeroed thick-provisioned disk, a block is filled with zeroes before data is written
for the first time.
Describe a Thin-Provisioned virtual disk.
A thin-provisioned disk uses only as much datastore space as the disk initially needs. If the thin disk needs more space later, it can expand to the maximum capacity allocated to it. Thin provisioning provides alarms and reports that track allocation versus the current use of
storage capacity. Storage administrators can use thin provisioning to optimize the allocation of storage for virtual environments. With thin provisioning, users can optimally but safely use the available disk space through overallocation.
What are the benefits of Content Libraries?
Storage efficiency and consistency are key reasons to install and use a content library.
Using content libraries, administrators can perform the following functions:
Store and share content, such as templates, ISO images, scripts.
Perform distributed file management.
Synchronize content libraries across sites and vCenter instances.
Mount an ISO file directly from a content library.
Maintain versions of VM templates.
Content libraries are stored on vSphere datastores.
