Before I do anything with VMware ESXi I do this first

For those that are running VMware ESXi in their home lab or production environments, there are many configurations that you will likely want to make on your ESXi host. Many of the configuration changes that need to be made will help to prepare your host for high availability, proper time synchronization, network configuration, storage, licensing, and adding your ESXi hosts to vCenter Server. In this video, I cover the first things I do on a VMware ESXi installation.
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Introduction to configuration changes to VMware ESXi - 0:00
Configuring the management interface - 0:48
Describing the Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) - 1:12
Configuring the management network - 1:33
Network adapter configuration - 1:45
Adding an additional network adapter for the management interface - 2:00
Configuring a specific VLAN for management traffic - 2:32
Setting a static IP address - 3:39
DNS configuration and DNS servers - 3:52
Setting the hostname - 4:00
DNS suffixes for DNS search suffixes - 4:13
Applying the changes and restarting the management network - 4:35
Logging into the ESXi host client - 4:55
Enabling SSH on your ESXi host - 5:12
Testing SSH connectivity to the ESXi host - 5:24
Patching the VMware ESXi host - 5:35
Software profiles and how they are used - 5:58
Getting the software profile - 6:06
Using the esxcli software profile update to update the ESXi server - 7:01
Setting the NTP server configuration in VMware ESXi - 7:35
Starting the NTP service - 8:38
Pointing your ESXi host to a syslog server - 9:03
Restarting the syslog service - 9:46
Adding the software iSCSI adapter - 9:54
Configuring iSCSI software adapter - 10:33
Adding a standalone ESXi host to a vCenter Server - 11:20
Beginning the add host wizard in vSphere Client to add to vCenter Server - 12:05
Behavior of the host after first adding to vCenter Server - 13:05
Adding VMkernel adapters in vSphere on your ESXi hosts - 13:29
Beginning the process to add VMkernel adapters and IP addresses - 14:00
Configuring the port properites - 14:25
Licensing the ESXi host - 15:22
Adding the license in the host client - 15:48
Adding a license in vCenter Server - 16:20
Concluding thoughts on ESXi settings I add on my VMware ESXi hosts - 17:32
VMware ESXi 8.0 Host client 2:
www.virtualizationhowto.com/2...
Upgrade to ESXi 8.0 in three ways:
www.virtualizationhowto.com/2...
VMware vSphere 8 download links:
www.virtualizationhowto.com/2...

[@danielastolarz8479]

Just completed the watch, moving on to implementing all of the steps on my test host. Thanks for your thorough and clear howto video!

[@muthyalakirankumar5530]

Really helpful video covers all operational build tasks

[@jamminwithjam]

This was absolutely phenomenal... Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[@BOOSTEDDUDE]

Thanks for this video. I'm getting prepared to help upgrade an environment that has lots of ESXi patches listed as Critical. I'm hoping to take the best approach possible.

[@peterbata3476]

Clear and Precise. Just the way I like it. Thank you for sharing your time and expertise with us. Much appreciated.

[@VirtualizationHowto]

I appreciate that!

[@raphaelgmur3898]

That was a really awesome video! Thank you very much! 👍😁

[@JasonsLabVideos]

AWESOME Awesome content, some of these things are really good practices !! Good work Brandon.

[@williamrgrant]

Great content, thank you! I would suggest applying a high pass filter to your mic in post, perhaps around 80-100 Hz. I'm listening on in-ear headphones and there is a fairly loud bump occasionally. It probably doesn't come through if editing on a laptop.

[@nalinavijitharan1780]

Thank you so much Clear content and professional way of explaining

[@sahayn9164]

Thank you so much for the excellent information.

[@smoothvideo1865]

Excellent VMware lesson

[@dv8inpp]

Followed your guide to do an upgrade and worked great. Thanks. The video is good but on my system there was a sync issue between audio and video, which I find very distracting. Not sure if it my system or the video.

[@bounponekeokhamphiew2458]

Thank you for explaining, it helped a lot.

[@screamingiraffe]

some really useful info, thank you for creating and sharing.

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Glad it was helpful!

[@miguellombana9847]

This tutorial rocked right up until the point where I tried to setup the new ports for vMotion (15:00 Min) my setup doesn't use VLans and the VLan field doesn't populate and thereby fails... still working on a solution but overall thanks for the help from this vid, helped me get my home lab to another level!

[@restrictanon4337]

Hello Brandon Lee, thank you for your great videos and detailed information. A question: I want to run a script or "esxcli" command during each ESXi boot. What's the best way to do that?

[@kevinstephens8172]

Realy Helpful video

[@tekviper9]

Every vSphere host in any shop / Lab / Enterprise I work I enable "ShareForceSalting = 0" and "Mem.ShareScanTime = 20" This setting pretty much dedeuplicates used memory blocks and give you the ability to run more VMs without swapping. And checks memory blocks every 20 min. These can be set in the advanced system settings.

[@herc.]

Thanks for sharing

[@chocodecorazon]

you need restart host after changed these configurations?

[@bygonebebygones8503]

This was disabled by default due to security reasons I believe so just think about the workload first.

[@Muhammadsaeed-se2ti]

Thank you for this effort, I am a newbie , I was wondering if you can tell us how to access our servers from outside network , your teacher method is great , I would love to learn more

[@mohammadsundal343]

Very nice, thanks.

[@gastonhitw720]

hi, I'm emulating esxi in vmware, if I want to add vm's to the esxi how many resourses should I give to my esxi? I'm running everything in my laptop

[@matthewella8280]

can you do a video on how to show the FQDN in vCenter instead of the ip address, without a active directory server

[@L-Minus]

What about backing up vCenter and the ESXi host configs?

[@VirtualizationHowto]

L-Minus, thanks for the comment! You can backup the ESXi configuration using PowerCLI (VMware's module for PowerShell) using the following: Get-VMHostFirmware -VMHost $host -BackupConfiguration -DestinationPath C:\HostBackups For vCenter Server, you can setup automated backups for your config there, by navigating to the VAMI interface (port 5480) and then navigating to the Backups menu. It will allow you to target FTP, SFTP, and other options for automatically backing up your VCSA appliance on a regular basis.

[@goruby2]

Thanks

[@samgao]

I have an Intel RAID for my PCIe optane drives (RAID10) But my ESXI 8 cannot see it. I've been scouring the internet to see how I can get them to see it, looked on VMWare's Compatible RAID controllers, and it mentioned that Intel VMD is the only solution for NVMe RAID. The BIOS sees the RAID 10, but not ESXi 8. Are there tutorials for this? Direct me in the right direction?

[@basudebbhanja1144]

Showing error amd-v/rvi is not supported on this platform, please tell me the solutions

[@58slewins31]

Hi, great video.

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Thanks for watching!

[@TheLmiksche]

Hi, where did u obtain that update link? Only think I found is a downloadable zip. Would be nice to show not just copy paste an leave the question unanswerd. Thanks.

[@cpuuk]

I haven't been in a VM environment since V5, but back then during the install routine we would make changes to the partitions sizes- do people still do this?

[@VirtualizationHowto]

CPU UK, I have to say not much. I usually just create a reasonable sized partition for ESXi (needs to be disks now instead of removable media as of vSphere 7 due to logging changes) but other than that, don't worry too much about disk sizes per se...hope this helps!

[@user-ul1jq2lt7j]

i hope you are there ! in good health, So, how to backup a " VM's" as i make in VirtualBox in Windows 8.1 ? i wanted to baukup (forexample ) windows XP or 7 or even 11 . BUT i was thinking to backup any of these VM's to use them to install windows to another Computer !! do you get my idea ?

[@Adamn32]

Hi, Can i clone the entire VMware ESXi server to the new SSD? If so how? Thx in advance.

[@ricobelgin5986]

You mentioned licensing methods. Do you have a video that shows what is includes the Vmug Advantage Licensing offerings?

[@VirtualizationHowto]

See here: www.vmug.com/membership/vmug-advantage-membership/

[@KLYT325]

thanks

[@wayneschneberger]

Show troubleshooting how tos in virtualization and were to click

[@thanukumarv1884]

Can anyone help me resetting root password for esxi 7 ? Vcenter is not configured .

[@Anuitu2u]

Hi, what can we do with VM backup+restore in ESXi (free)? Is it only available with 3rd party tools? Can we schedule the task?

[@Mr_Sh1tcoin]

Veeam community edition

[@danielanderson9052]

can you please add the text command for patching hosts Thanks

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Daniel, you can use the following: ## Open ESXi host firewall to allow the host to connect to the Internet esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r httpClient ## Get your current profile esxcli software sources profile list -d ##Enter maintenance mode on the host - vim-cmd /hostsvc/maintenance_mode_enter ##Run the command to update your host: esxcli software profile update -d hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml -p ESXi-8.0.0-20513097-standard A site I have had bookmarked for years now is the following: Virten.net...he keeps the latest profiles listed so it makes running the command above easy as you just replace the profile name after the -p with the profile listed here: www.virten.net/vmware/vmware-esxi-image-profiles/

[@MACROSS2KYTB]

If there are a lot of ESXi host, maybe there is something like automation script to manage all of systems at once. Or vCenter Server?

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Justin, thanks for your comment! Yes, many of these types of processes and procedures can be accomplished with tools like PowerCLI or Ansible. Also, there is a mechanism in vSphere called a "Host profile" that allows applying almost "template like" settings to ESXi hosts.

[@Tech-geeky]

esxi time NTP settings do not always work well... Depends on the OS running and clients, there can be time delays (up 5 seconds differences) between domain and clients, and in some cases client not getting updated at all.. Perhaps that is why this option should be kept enabled????

[@tonygutierrez4711]

So, in other words, you just set it up?

[@Mongo11b]

Maybe someone can help me figure out what I’m doing wrong. I just started using Vsphere, I have the VMDK size set as preallocated. However, inside of Vsphere, the storage shows the correct amount but the datastore is only 16gb. I’ve tried expanding the datastore of creating a new one with no success

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Daniel, what type of storage are you using?

[@Mongo11b]

@@VirtualizationHowto thanks for replying, after some digging I found that at least inside of a VM, ESXi reserves 119gb for whatever reason. I just created a second VHD and it works perfectly.

[@timgerk3262]

If that syslog setting is going to work, you need open syslog ports on the firewall.

[@VirtualizationHowto]

Tim, great shout on that front. You are right that is required. I missed that in the vid.

[@markfrederick4792]

Some of the latest syslog services (ie. Splunk) benefit from receiving traffic on a specific/non-standard port (ie. not the default port 514). Is there a way from cli or gui to designate a custom port with the IP address, and match that in the firewall settings ?

[@mattpdx86]

Can you help me

[@user-ij7lw3zt4h]

I often wonder why, after 20+ years, such a fundamental and very important service such as NTP is disabled and unset by default.

[@VirtualizationHowto]

M, yes exactly!

[@kirimayro]

перед как посрать я делаю эти вещи: встаю с дивана, захожу в туалет, закрываю дверь и т.д.

[@edwardmacnab354]

lost in the details , and yet , nobody explains what is going on at a fundamental level. I do understand that most of the details occur on vmware servers , and that what you have esxi installed on is almost irrelevant.