I got my test environment (DL 585G1) placed in the server rack at my work. I was busy with a Terminal Server tweak blogpost on VMware.. but also playing with the RDweb portal and decided to publish the vSphere Client for the “vCenter Admin” AD security group. I must say.. this application is big.. but.. streaming is not a problem! Here some facts:

ISP connection:

Work ISP: 10/10 MBit (server located)

Home ISP: 35/35 MBit

^ My personal portal with Office 2010, TweetDeck and the vSphere Client

^ Pruttel.. Pruttel..

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Vmware released a new vCenter Converter Standalone version which is now fully compatible with vSphere 4.1.

 

What’s New

The VMware vCenter Converter Standalone 4.3 includes the following new functionality:

• Support for VMware vSphere 4.1 as source and destination targets
• Support for importing powered-off Microsoft Hyper-V R1 and Hyper-V R2 virtual machines
• Public API and sample code for submitting and monitoring Converter jobs
• Support for importing Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2 sources
• Ability to throttle the data transfer from source to destination based on network bandwidth or CPU
• IPv6 support

Discontinued Support

• Support of the following operating systems is discontinued:
  • Windows 2000
  • Windows NT
• Support for OVF format is discontinued
• Support for VCB image sources is discontinued
• Linux installation support is discontinued

Check out the release notes after the jump and download it here

Today I started with upgrading my production Windows 2008 PDC’s to the R2 release. After mounting the Windows 2008 R2 DVD I received two warnings:

- You must have 15 GB of free space (it’s VMware.. so what’s the problem?)

- Prepare a Windows Server 2003 Forest Schema for a Domain Controller that runs Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2

To do step 2 you need to do a few things:

- Mount Windows Server 2008 R2 cd-rom

- Start CMD with Administrator rights (run as Administrator)

- Type: D:\Support\adprep\adprep /forestprep [Enter]

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The NoDrives tool creates a ADM files to remove the icons representing selected drives from My Computer and from Windows Explorer. Also, the drive letters representing the selected drives do not appear in the standard Open dialog box.

This tool creates a easy to use Group Policy Template. You do not need to calculate the drive value you only have to check the drives you want to hide and create the ADM.

APPLIES TO

• Windows Server 2008 R2
• Windows Server 2008
• Microsoft Windows Server 2003,
• Microsoft Windows 2000

Download it here.

We already posted a solution. This is the official unofficial unsupported VMware KB

• You cannot launch the vSphere Client
• If you install the vSphere Client in Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 and try to connect to the vSphere server, you see the errors:
  • Error parsing the server "<servername>" "clients.xml" file.
  • The type initializer for VirtualInfrastructure.Utils.HttpWebRequestProxy’ threw an exception.

The vSphere Client is not currently supported in Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 and it does not run in Compatibility Mode.

This issue may occur because of the .NET loading mechanism change in Windows 2008 R2 and Windows 7.

There are 2 possible workarounds. Perform one of these options:

• Install a Windows XP virtual machine in Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 using Windows XP Mode.
• Bypass the normal .NET Framework loading mechanism.
  Warning: This workaround is unsupported.
  To bypass the normal .NET Framework loading mechanism:

1. Download the file system.dll. This file is typically located in  %SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\ directory of a non-Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 machine with .NET v3.5 SP1 installed.

2. Copy the file to C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\Virtual Infrastructure Client\Launcher\lib.
Note: If the lib directory does not exist, create it.

3. Open VpxClient.exe.config in a text editor. The file is located at C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\Virtual Infrastructure Client\Launcher.

4. Add the following three lines to VpxClient.exe.config, just before </configuration>:
<runtime>
<developmentMode developerInstallation="true"/>
</runtime>

5. From Windows 2008 R2 or Windows 7 System Properties, click the Advanced tab > Environment Variables.

6. Create a new System variable called DEVPATH and assign the value:
C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\Virtual Infrastructure Client\Launcher\Lib
Note: For 32bit operating systems, replace Program Files (x86)with Program Files.
You can now launch vSphere Client from a Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 machine. You may have to right-click on the vSphere Client icon and choose Run as administrator.