Moving the vCenter 5 SQL Database from local SQL Express to full blown sql server

There are a few things I had to do when moving the sql database from the local install on SQL Express on the vCenter server itself to a full blown SQL server. Firstly, I followed the steps set out in this article.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=7960893

Then I had to change a few of the other services to use the account set up for the vCenter server service. I'm not sure if they were all needed but I changed the vCenter Inventory Service, the VMWare VirtualCenter Management Webservices, the VMWare VirtualCenter Server, VMWare vSphere Profile-Driven Storage Service

and the VMWare vSphere Update Manager UFA Service.

After that I was unable to view performance information. I discovered that the web services were still pointing at the local SQL express install for the database. To change this the vcdb.properties file located in "C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter" had to be changed.

Also as a additional change, I wanted to stop the sql express service from running, however the vCenter Server service was dependant on it, so I had to remove that dependency.

• Stop the vCenter Server service
• Take a backup of your registry
• Under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services, find the vpxd service.
• Right-click on the string value "DependOnService" and select "Modify".
• You should now see a list of services that it is dependent on. Delete the sql express service (mine was called MSSQL$SQLEXP_VIM).
• Repeat the steps for HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\ControlSet001\Services and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\ControlSet002\Services.
• Set the SQL Express servicices to disabled.
• Restart the Server.

vRanger 5

Looks like others are having the issue with vRanger 5 that I have.

http://vcommunity.vizioncore.com/dataprotection/vrangerpro/f/60/t/1799.aspx

VMotion takes out the network

Over the weekend we had an issue with a switch in the back of our Dell M1000. It appeared to have died. During that time when we did a vmotion we lost connectivity to servers in the same physical switch that the M1000 chassis switch is connected to.

Our network engineer has now replaced the switch in the M1000 however the issue of connectivity loss when doing a vmotion still occurs. I stumbled upon this post which is very similar, (we too have everything on the same subnet) http://communities.vmware.com/thread/306862 We are still on esx3.5 but wandered if it was relevant. We'll have to ask the netwrok guys to do some monitoring when we try it again.

vRanger 5

Decided to remove the whole repositry (after backing it up) to see if this would get me the incs back.

vRanger 5

Looks like vRanger 5 is concerned with the excluded vms in the job options. Which is why it seems to be constantly doing fulls, instead of incs. I also noticed that it wasn't clearing old jobs out, so I've manually done it. I'll see if that helps with the backup type.

vRanger 5

Last week I upgraded our VMWare ESX3.5 backup solution (vRanger) from 4.5 to 5. The upgrade went well however some guests that had snapshots already suddenly stopped being backed up. After I removed the snapshots vRanger was able to back them up again, even if they had had a new snapshot taken.

I've just had a look in the repository, and by the looks of it it has only been doing full backups since the upgrade and not incremental backups like it should do. I shall have to investigate this further.