Hyper-v 3.0

Here is an article that explains the enhancements coming in Server 8 regarding Hyper-V 3.0, pretty exciting.

http://www.windowsitpro.com/blog/michael-oteys-blog-21/virtualization/windows-server-8-hyperv-30-evens-odds-vsphere-140573

Start Hyper-V VM using Powershell

VMM wasn’t able to communicate with our Hyper-V hosts so I was asked, how do you start a VM using Powershell.  This was also complicated by the fact I built the Hyper-V hosts with Windows Server 2008 R2 core.  Here is a good article that explains how to do so with a few other commands that will help in managing your system via Powershell.

http://www.virtualizationadmin.com/articles-tutorials/microsoft-hyper-v-articles/storage-management/administer-microsoft-hyper-v-command-line-cli.html

Virtualized NTP DC with Incorrect Time

So we were having an issue with all of our machines having a time that was lagging minutes behind and I had our PDC emulator DC configured as the NTP.  There wasn’t a firewall blocking connection to the external time source and resetting the DC’s clock to the correct time was only temporarily fixing the issue.

I found this article that explains why the DC’s time would never self heal as the Integrated Services would force the VM to pull the Time Synchronization from the Hyper-V host during a reboot.  To disable this, use the Hyper-V manager and uncheck Time Synchronization with Integrated Servers.

Not only is this an informative article, the author has a mouth like a sailor, I dig it.

http://www.aperture.ro/index.php/2009/01/windows-time-sync-hyper-v-enabled-domain-controller-dilemma/

Migrate VMs from Virtual Server to Hyper-V

Thanks to Richard Carpenter for the script.

1. Uninstall VM Additions on each VM
2. Power down VM(s)
3. Run this script which will change all SCSI controllers to IDE as Hyper-V only supports IDE.

   ‘==========================================================================
   ‘
   ‘ VBScript Source File — Created with SAPIEN Technologies PrimalScript 4.1
   ‘
   ‘ NAME:
   ‘
   ‘ AUTHOR: richardCarpenter , Microsoft Corp
   ‘ DATE  : 9/21/2008
   ‘
   ‘ COMMENT: checks the disk adapters and type and if it is SCSI it changes
   ‘ the type to IDE
   ‘
   ‘==========================================================================
   option explicit
   ‘On Error Resume Next
   dim id
   dim rtn
   dim objvs
   dim colvms
   dim objvm
   dim colArgs
   DIM hdskConnections
   dim objhdskconnection
   dim objHardDisk
   dim strfile
   Set objVS = CreateObject("VirtualServer.Application")
   set colVMs = objVS.VirtualMachines
   set colArgs = wscript.Arguments
   id = 0
   For Each objVM in colVMs
       If objVM.Name = colArgs.item(0) then
        set hdskConnections = objVM.HardDiskConnections
        For Each objhdskconnection In hdskConnections
                   set objHardDisk = objhdskconnection.HardDisk
     strFile  = objHardDisk.File
                   wscript.echo "VM Disk File" & strfile
            If objhdskconnection.BusType = 1 Then
               rtn = objhdskconnection.SetBusLocation (0,0,id)
        id = id+1
            End If
        Next
   End if
   Next

4. Use VMM to migrate VM to Hyper-V server

Unable to install Virtual Guest Services

Here was my scenario.

I have Server 2008 R2 Core running Hyper-V and when I created a VM, Server 2003 Standard x86 w/ SP1, I couldn’t install Virtual Guest Services with the following error:

Error (13233)
Unable to install Virtual Guest Services on virtual machine Vista. The
Hyper-V Integration Services setup exited with error code 60001.

I found out from searching the web that the VM must be up to SP2 to allow the Virtual Guest Services to start.  This resolved my issue.