TechVirtuoso

Eight new VMWare ESX 3.5 patches released

September 1st, 2009 at 9:59 PM  1 Comment

vmware_infrastructure_scVMWare has released eight patches for ESX 3.5, four of the eight patches are rated as critical from VMWare. There are no updates for VMWare ESXi. The updates can be downloaded from the VMWare ESX 3.5 Support website and installed manually by the using esxupdate from the command line of the host, or they can be automatically applied through VMWare Update Manager. For most of these patches, all virtual machine guests must be migrated to another host or shutdown before the patch is applied. The host server will then require a reboot.

Due to the critical nature of many of these patches, VMWare recommends quick evaluation and application of these patches.

ESX350-200908401-BG, Updates forcedeth driver
The forcedeth driver installed on the ESX hosts causes the NVIDIA nForce Network Controller NICs to lose network connectivity until the forcedeth driver is reloaded. This patch addresses the issue.

The affected NICS are:

  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 2200 MCP 1Gbe NIC
  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 2050 I/O companion chip 1Gbe NIC
  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 3600 1Gbe NIC

ESX350-200908402-BG, Updates VMware Tools
After performing VMotion between ESX 3.0.x and ESX 3.5 hosts, virtual machines running on ESX 3.5 hosts are restarted in order to upgrade to the latest version of VMware Tools. After applying this fix, VMware Tools function as expected.

ESX350-200908403-BG, Updates megaraid and mptscsi drivers
This patch fixes the following issues:

  • When the ESX host boots, the megaraid_sas driver heap gets depleted when claiming 4 LSI SAS RAID controllers on IBM System x3950 M2 Athena servers. This issue might cause the ESX host to stop booting. The fix increases the heap size for the megaraid_sas driver from 8 MB to 16 MB.
  • The mptscsi_2xx driver limits the discovery of targets to 63 SAS devices per LSI Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) host bus adapter (HBA). This fix increases the number of targets to the value returned by the HBA firmware.

ESX350-200908404-BG, Updates vmkctl
When N-Port ID Virtualization (NPIV) enabled virtual machines are powered on on ESX hosts, a rescan issued from the VI Client results in an error message stating that the rescan failed, even if the rescan is successful.

ESX350-200908405-BG, Updates vmkernel
Running the esxtop command on the service console of the ESX hosts lists high values for the max limited (%MLMTD) parameter for virtual machines when no max limited parameter is set. When the high values are listed, the performance of the virtual machines might be affected. In the VI Client, the max limited parameter is set in the Resources tab for CPU in Virtual Machine properties.

ESX350-200908406-BG, Updates vmx
This patch provides the following:

  • Adds support for new SCSI-3 status values in the SCSI emulation for virtual machines.
  • Fixes an issue where powering on customized versions of Ubuntu virtual machines from the ESX hosts might cause the ESX hosts to stop responding.

ESX350-200908407-BG, Updates kernel source and vmnix
This patch updates the service console kernel for the following fixes:

The forcedeth driver installed on the ESX hosts causes the NVIDIA nForce Network Controller NICs to lose network connectivity under certain circumstances. The affected NICS are:

  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 2200 MCP 1Gbe NIC
  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 2050 I/O companion chip 1Gbe NIC
  • NVIDIA nForce Professional 3600 1Gbe NIC

A bnx2x firmware dump issue.

The mptscsi_2xx driver limits the discovery of targets to 63 SAS devices per LSI Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) host bus adapter (HBA). This fix increases the number of targets to the value returned by the HBA firmware.

ESX350-200908408-BG, Updates bnx2x driver
This patch fixes a bnx2x firmware dump issue.

Source: Boche

Mac OS X 10.6 released today

August 28th, 2009 at 9:56 AM  1 Comment

MC223Apple has released the latest version of their OS X operating system, version 10.6 or “Snow Leopard” for both desktops and servers. Current 10.5 users can upgrade to 10.6 for $29 per machine for the desktop or $499 for the server. 10.6 is only supported on Intel based Macs.

The desktop version features enhanced Exchange support, enabling programs like Mail, iCal and Address Book to communicate directly with our Microsoft Exchange 2007 servers. Both versions also feature enhanced support for x64 based computing, and have a x64 based kernel.

As we reported earlier in the week, 10.6 also includes built in malware scanning, something not mentioned anywhere on the Apple website.

The server version also includes a new SSL based VPN service, as well as new versions of iCal server and Address Book server, as well as updates to the built in Mail server.

Order: ClientServer

Update: Be sure to check the recently published 10.6 application incompatibility chart before upgrading. A few popular anti-virus programs as well as versions of Parallels Desktop are listed as restricted during install. Aperture 2.1.1. is also listed as unable to load after installing.

Internet Explorer 8 now on Windows Server Update Services

August 27th, 2009 at 12:17 PM  1 Comment

Microsoft has begun pushing out Windows Internet Explorer 8 via Windows Server Update Services, as it announced back in June that it would start doing. The package is published as an update rollup, so WSUS administrators who have their systems set to automatically approve such packages will want to be careful after synchronizing if they’re not ready for a full IE8 deployment.

Only systems with Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, and Windows Server 2008 will be able to upgrade to Internet Explorer 8. Systems still running Windows 2000 will be stuck on Internet Explorer 6.

Internet Explorer 8 was released to the general public in March 2009.

Intel launches pluggable 10GbE NICs

August 26th, 2009 at 12:06 PM  1 Comment

X520ImagesIntel has announced the launch of their new Ethernet Server Adapter X520 family, their first 10 Gigabit (GbE) adapter that support “pluggable” optics. Intel claims the additional configuration options in the X520 give administrators “more flexibility in how they deploy 10GbE in their servers and datacenters.”

Previously 10GbE adapters required the purchase of an additional SR adapter to function, the X520 is compatable with SR, LR or SFP+ direct attach cable all from the same card. This allows administrators to switch back and forth after purchase without buying all new cards, just new optics.

The card is based on the Intel 82599 10 Gigabit Ethernet Controller and also has backwards compatible support for 1GbE, which Intel claims is an industry first.

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