If you can’t reconnect an ESX host, SSH into your service console and restart the following services:

service vmware-vpxa restart
service mgmt-vmware retart
service xinetd restart
service vmware-vmkauthd restart

——-

Wait for a few minutes, then try reconnecting.

——-

If the mgmt-vmware gets hung up, you need to kill the hostd process. I like to leave one putty session open, and open a new session.

To find the PID:

ps -ef | grep hostd

Kill the process:
kill -9 ####

After this you should see the mgmt-vmware service complete it’s stop or restart.

——–

If it still doesn’t work, try removing the vpxa agent from the ESX host. After it’s removed, it will automatically be re-installed when you add it via the vSphere client.

———-

SSH into your ESX server

Check for vpxa version: rpm -qa |grep vpxa

You should see something like VMware-vpxa-4.0.0-162856.

Stop the VMware management service: service mgmt-vmware stop

Stop the vpx agent: service vmware-vpxa stop or /etc/init.d/vmware-vpxa stop

Uninstall vpx agent: rpm -e VMware-vpxa-4.0.0-162856

Verify vpxa has uninstalled: rpm -qa |grep vpxa (or vpx just in case)

Start the VMware management service: service mgmt-vmware start

——–

Remove your ESX host via vSphere client. Add it back in. Hopefully it works.

If it doesn’t work after all this, you probably have to reboot.

I was really impressed and pleased with the notebook I received. Some of my favorite feature of this notebook are as follows:

The large 15.6 inch display with integrated webcam which is bright and a pleasure to use.

The keyboard is great, I really like the placement of the home and end keys on the right side of the notebook which I use regularly. Also on the keyboard, I like the layout of the Ctrl and Fn key which were placed in the spots I like the most. I also liked the easy access to control volume and brightness and that these were the primary functions, whereas the F1 - F12 function are secondary.

I love that this notebook was designed for comfort. I didn’t notice any extreme heat issues and I really loved that the edges of the notebook were rounded and are very comfortable on the wrists and arms.

Lastly I liked that there was an integrated SD card reader.

What could have been improved?

These things didn’t bother me too much, but worth mentioning. While this is a budget friendly notebook, I still wish it had an HDMI port. This system only has a VGA port.

I think the touch pad could have been a lot better. I wish it was bigger and adopted the new format of a single large touch pad that depresses for the clicks. This is very minor though since 90% of the time I use an external wireless mouse.

Overall I think it’s a nice system.

Here is my YouTube Unboxing Video:

1. Click the start windows icon.
2. Right click on the “computer” link.
3. Click on Properties

Down at the bottom you’ll see a section for Windows Activation.

4. Click on Change Product Key
5. Enter your given Product Key
6. Activate should work now.

To resolve this you can duplicate your SSH session in another window and kill the process.

Steps:

1. ps -ef | grep vmware-hostd
2. look for something like this: /usr/lib/vmware/hostd/vmware-hostd /etc/vmware/hostd/config.xm
3. kill -9 <PID>

After doing this, you should be able to start the service back up.

First let me say what I do like. Overall the notebook is beautiful, it’s definitely an eye catcher and looks great. I am also amazed with the screen, it is probably the best screen I’ve ever seen on a notebook. The panel type on my system is a LTN133AT09.

I also like the chiclet keyboard. I found that it has good feedback and I like that the keys at the top use the volume, brightness, etc as the primary option as opposed to the F keys. The only part of the keyboard I wish was different was the placement of the fn and control key.

I also like the trackpad, it is very big and I like how the entire pad depresses for clicking. I also like using gestures. I was using two fingers to scroll through webpages very nicely. Looking forward to gestures becoming mainstream on all notebooks.

Now, for the features that are making me return it.

The biggest disappointment for me are the extremely sharp edges. They really dig into my arms and it is very uncomfortable. I really think this was a design flaw and that Apple should have rolled these edges instead of making them come to a sharp point. If you google “macbook pro sharp edges”, you’ll see a lot of discussion. This is the primary reason for my return, otherwise I would have kept it.

Sharp Edge of Macbook Pro

The second thing is how OS X renders fonts on their OS. There is also a lot of discussion about this on the web. Some people say they prefer how it looks on OS X, but I prefer the sharpness and crispness of how it looks on the PC. It just appears blurry to me. Here is a good post showing some comparison screenshots between OS X and a PC of exactly what I’m referring to.

Lastly, OS X has pretty poor mouse support. If you come from a PC, you’ll notice that the mouse is slow and jerky. Some people have resorted to using a program called USB Overdrive, but that still doesn’t completely solve the issue. I found the best solution was to install Microsoft’s Intellipoint for mac. You can also do a cool hack to make your Logitech mouse work with it. Good post on how to do it here.

If the next design of the mbp fixes the sharp edges, I might pickup another one. Apple was nice enough to waive the restocking fee and pay for the return shipping for me which I was very happy to hear.

Here was my unboxing of the Macbook Pro

SQL 2005:

X86: http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/D/44DBDE61-B385-4FC2-A67D-48053B8F9FAD/sqlncli.msi
X64: http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/D/44DBDE61-B385-4FC2-A67D-48053B8F9FAD/sqlncli_x64.msi
IA64: http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/D/44DBDE61-B385-4FC2-A67D-48053B8F9FAD/sqlncli_ia64.msi

SQL 2008:

X86: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=123717&clcid=0×409
X64: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=123718&clcid=0×409
IA64: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=123719&clcid=0×409

First you’ll have to go to Server Manager -> Roles -> Add Role -> Network Policy and Access Servers. Within there you’ll see an option for Routing and Remote Access. Be sure to select that. After that’s installed you can go to Computer Management and configure Routing and Remote Access which located under the Services and Application drop down. Configure it for NAT, and anything else you want to do . Once configured select IPv4 -> NAT, then right click on your public adapter. Then you’ll see an option for Services and Ports and you can add a new one. Here you will set your incoming port, and then address and port you want it forwarded to.

That’s how it’s done. Very useful. You can also do it just as well in Windows 2003 server.

Error Messages:

An error occurred during configuration of the HA Agent on the host.

Configuration Issues:

Insufficient resources to satisfy HA failover level on cluster [clustername] in [datacenter]
Unable to contact a primary HA agent in cluster [clustername] in [datacenter]

HA Logs are located in:

/var/log/vmware/aam

In my scenario I wasn’t able to add the ESX host to a new HA cluster. I performed the following command:

less aam_config_util_addnote.log

From here I combed through the log and was able to find that an HA requirement is being able to ping the gateway. This VMware cluster was in a DMZ type environment, so I was unable to do so.

After getting a firewall setting changed and verifying the gateway can ping, I could then configure my ESX host for HA.

Hope this might help someone.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=d09c1d60-a13c-4479-9b91-9e8b9d835cdc&displaylang=en

Another error you might get with the same issue is this when doing the install:

Setup has detected that the VirtualCenter Service is not running on this system. Please wait for the service to start and then try installing VMware Update Manager and/or VMware converter again.

Hope that might help someone.