As you might know, the new version of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 comes with tons of new features and nice configurations that will change the way we manage not only our virtual environment, but the most important components of our datacenter.

To be prepared and learn almost everything about it from scratch, my friend Alessandro Cardoso has written a great book walking through the product. Check it out:

System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 Cookbook

What you will learn from this book

• How to use VMM Architecture and plan for a real word deployment
• Utilize Network Virtualization, Gateway integration, Storage integration, Resource Throttling, and Availability options
• Deploy Operations Manager and integrate with VMM
• Integrate SC APP Controller with VMM to manage Private and Public Clouds (Azure)
• Cluster deployment with VMM Bare Metal
• Create and deploy Virtual Machines from Templates
• Deploy a highly available VMM Management Server
• Manage Hyper-V, Vmware, and Citrix from VMM
• How to upgrade from SCVMM 2008R2 to SCVMM 2012 SP1

In Detail

Microsoft System Center 2012 is a comprehensive IT infrastructure, virtualization, and cloud management platform. With System Center 2012, you can more easily and efficiently manage your applications and services across multiple hypervisors as well as across public and private cloud infrastructures to deliver flexible and cost-effective IT services for your business.

This cookbook covers architecture design and planning and is full of deployment tips, techniques, and solutions designed to show users how to improve VMM 2012 in a real world scenario. It will guide you to create, deploy, and manage your own Private Cloud with a mix of Hypervisors: Hyper-V, Vmware ESXi, and Citrix XenServer. It also includes the VMM 2012 SP1 features.

This book is a cookbook that covers architecture design, planning and is full of deployment tips, techniques and solutions designed to show users how to improve VMM 2012 in a real world scenario. It will guide you to create, deploy and manage your own Private Cloud with a mix of Hypervisors : Hyper-V, Vmware ESXi and Citrix XenServer.

To get you an idea of how good the book is, Alessandro made the chapter 6, Upgrading from SCVMM 2008 R2 SP1 to SCVMM 2012 for free.

The book is available at Amazon. Click here for more details.

Enjoy it.

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

Hi there!

The System Center team is running a series of webcasts talking about Windows Server, Hyper-V and the System Center products.

I will start the series on 24/04 Wednesday, 8:00AM PST (1:00AM in Australia and 12:00PM in Brazil). My presentation, Automating the Hyper-V Administration with PowerShell, will walk through some details about the new version of PowerShell and how easy it is to manage your virtual environment using simple PowerShell commandlets. The webcast will focus IT Pros and how they can save time and resources to improve their Hyper-V servers with simple tasks and commands.

To join the Webcast, use the following links:

https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=918C54A82D3B2A31&id=918C54A82D3B2A31%21107

I hope to see you all there!

Leandro Carvalho 
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine 
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

It’s been a very busy year for a couple of MVPs that are writing about Hyper-V.

The first one, written by Aidan Finn, Patrick Lownds, Michel Luescher and Damian Flynn, was published on Amazon:

Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Installation and Configuration Guide

Go-to guide for using Microsoft’s updated Hyper-V as a virtualization solution

Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V offers greater scalability, new components, and more options than ever before for large enterprise systems and small/medium businesses. Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Installation and Configuration Guide is the place to start learning about this new cloud operating system. You’ll get up to speed on the architecture, basic deployment and upgrading, creating virtual workloads, designing and implementing advanced network architectures, creating multitenant clouds, backup, disaster recovery, and more.

The international team of expert authors offers deep technical detail, as well as hands-on exercises and plenty of real-world scenarios, so you thoroughly understand all features and how best to use them.

• Explains how to deploy, use, manage, and maintain the Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V virtualization solutions in large enterprises and small- to medium-businesses
• Provides deep technical detail and plenty of exercises showing you how to work with Hyper-V in real-world settings
• Shows you how to quickly configure Hyper-V from the GUI and use PowerShell to script and automate common tasks
• Covers deploying Hyper-V hosts, managing virtual machines, network fabrics, cloud computing, and using file servers
• Also explores virtual SAN storage, creating guest clusters, backup and disaster recovery, using Hyper-V for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), and other topics

Help make your Hyper-V virtualization solution a success with Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Installation and Configuration Guide.

The second book covers the Hyper-V deployment, written by Zahir Hussain Shah and reviewed by another Hyper-V MVP: Lai Yoong Seng:

Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V: Deploying Hyper-V Enterprise Server Virtualization Platform

Building Hyper-V infrastructure with secured multitenancy, flexible infrastructure, scalability, and high availability

Overview

• A complete step-by-step Hyper-V deployment guide, covering all Hyper-V features for configuration and management best practices.
• Understand multi-tenancy, flexible architecture, scalability, and high availability features of new Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V.
• Learn Hyper-V Replica, Hyper-V Extensible Virtual Switch, Virtual Machine Migration, Hyper-V Storage, Hyper-V Failover Clustering, and also System Center VMM and DPM for management, backup, and recovery.

In Detail

Over a short span of time, server virtualization has been one of the most rapidly adopted technologies in IT business. Microsoft Hyper-V is a hardware-assisted hypervisor product, available as a server role in the Windows Server operating system. Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V provides cutting-edge server virtualization features for a scalable, flexible, and highly available virtual machine infrastructure.

“Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V: Deploying Hyper-V Enterprise Server Virtualization Platform” is a comprehensive guide, which starts itself from basic virtualization and server consolidation concepts, and then goes deeper for discussing advanced topics, such as a Hyper-V scalability, failover, and virtual machine migration. This book is an ideal choice for those who are stepping into Hyper-V world, and also for those who are experts in Hyper-V and want to advance their skills with the new Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V.

This book contains topics starting from introducing Hyper-V as a hypervisor, and then moves ahead with covering advanced topics, related to Hyper-V configuration and virtual machine management.

The book starts with getting to know Hyper-V, and then we discuss planning, designing, and the implementation of Hyper-V. It then goes with advanced topics such as Hyper-V Replica, Hyper-V Networking and Storage, Hyper-V High Availability, and so on.

“Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V: Deploying Hyper-V Enterprise Server Virtualization Platform” is an expert guide for discussing Hyper-V configuration and management topics.

Well done guys!

Leandro Carvalho 
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine 
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

I’ve started to take a couple of Microsoft exams and I thought it would be good to share some handy information with you.

For those who want to take Microsoft exams, the promotion “Second Shot” is back and now it also brings some discounts when buying certification packs: http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/second-shot.aspx

The idea is that you can take the exam again for free in case you fail.

For your labs, there is also a great news: You can build a whole lab infrastructure for free (90 days) in the cloud, allowing you to access it from everywhere.

With Windows Azure, you can subscribe for the free trial and create lots of virtual machines, including Windows and Linux OSes.

The VM configuration is not too bad, as shown in the next screenshot, and it’s enough to build a lab for almost all scenarios.

If you are interested in using Azure to build your labs, these 2 links show the step-by-step to create the virtual machines and even a SharePoint lab.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/askpfeplat/archive/2013/01/07/windows-azure-virtualization-a-lab-in-the-clouds-for-every-it-pro.aspx

http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithmayer/archive/2013/01/07/step-by-step-build-a-free-sharepoint-2013-lab-in-the-cloud-with-windows-azure-31-days-of-servers-in-the-cloud-part-7-of-31.aspx

Another good news is the fact you can get heaps of free Microsoft training (lot’s of exam preparation ones) on Microsoft Virtual Academy, check it out:

http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/Studies/SearchResult.aspx

I hope that helps, now… Studying Time!
Enjoy!

Leandro Carvalho 
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine 
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

It’s a pleasure to announce the release of my Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Cookbook.

As the first and only available Hyper-V 3.0 book at the moment, the idea of this cookbook is to help you to become a Hyper-V expert with a easy to ready and follow recipe format that will guide you thought all Hyper-V features.

All recipes give you the introduction of the content being discussed, the “how to” process and the section “how it works”. Another interesting thing about them is that almost all recipes have PowerShell commands and examples to help you to automate the Hyper-V management.

In detail:

Virtualization has proved that it can help organizations to reduce costs, and the Private Cloud has created a revolution in the way we manage and control our servers with centralization and elasticity. The new Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V release from Microsoft comes with a myriad of improvements in areas such as mobility, high availability and elasticity, bringing everything you need to create, manage and build the core components of a Microsoft Private Cloud for virtualized workloads.

“Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Cookbook” is the perfect accompaniment for Hyper-V administrators looking to take advantage of all the exciting new features the release has to offer. Through practical recipes, you’ll master Hyper-V deployment, migration and management.

“Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Cookbook” is an essential resource for any Hyper-V administrator looking to migrate, install and manage their virtual machine efficiently.

With all the features of Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V covered, you will learn everything from installation to disaster recovery, security, high availability, configuration, automation, architecture and monitoring, all in a practical recipe format. The book also includes new features such as Storage and Shared Nothing Live Migration, Hyper-V Replica and Network Virtualization and much more.

With “Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Cookbook” in hand, you’ll be equipped to manage your Private Cloud with ease.

• Chapter 1: Installing and Managing Hyper-V in Full or Server Core Mode
  • Introduction
  • Verifying Hyper-V requirements
  • Enabling the Hyper-V role
  • Installing Windows Server 2012 and Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012
  • Managing a Server Core installation using sconfig
  • Enabling and disabling the graphical interface in Hyper-V
  • Configuring post-installation settings
• Chapter 2: Migrating and Upgrading Physical and Virtual Servers
  • Introduction
  • Performing an in-place upgrade from Windows Server 2008 R2 to Windows Server 2012
  • Exporting and importing virtual machines
  • Migrating virtual machines and updating their integration services
  • Converting VHD files to VHDX files
  • Migrating Virtual Machine storage using Storage Migration
  • Migrating virtual machines using Shared Nothing Live Migration
  • Converting physical computers to virtual machines
• Chapter 3: Managing Disk and Network Settings
  • Introduction
  • Creating and adding virtual hard disks
  • Configuring IDE and SCSI controllers for virtual machines
  • Creating resource pools
  • Creating and managing virtual switches
  • Using advanced settings for virtual networks
  • Enabling and adding NIC teaming to a virtual machine
  • Configuring and adding Hyper-V Virtual Fibre Channel to virtual machines
• Chapter 4: Saving Time and Cost with Hyper-V Automation
  • Introduction
  • Installing and running Hyper-V from a USB stick
  • Creating virtual machine templates
  • Learning and utilizing basic commands in PowerShell
  • Using small PowerShell commands for daily tasks
  • Enabling and working with remote connection and administration through PowerShell
• Chapter 5: Hyper-V Best Practices, Tips, and Tricks
  • Introduction
  • Using the Hyper-V Best Practices Analyzer
  • Setting up dynamic memory for virtual machines
  • Enabling remote management for Hyper-V in workgroup environments
  • Installing and configuring an anti-virus on host and virtual machines
• Chapter 6: Security and Delegation of Control
  • Introduction
  • Configuring Windows Update for Hyper-V
  • Configuring Cluster-Aware Updating for cluster nodes
  • Delegating control in Hyper-V
  • Configuring Port ACLs
  • Installing and configuring BitLocker for data protection
  • Configuring Hyper-V auditing
• Chapter 7: Configuring High Availability in Hyper-V
  • Introduction
  • Installing and configuring an iSCSI Target server in Windows Server 2012
  • Installing and configuring the Windows Failover Clustering feature
  • Enabling Cluster Shared Volumes 2.0
  • Using Live Migration in a cluster environment
  • Configuring VM Priority for Clustered Virtual Machines
• Chapter 8: Disaster Recovery for Hyper-V
  • Introduction
  • Backing up Hyper-V and virtual machines using Windows Server Backup
  • Restoring Hyper-V and virtual machines using Windows Server Backup
  • Configuring Hyper-V Replica between two Hyper-V hosts using HTTP authentication
  • Configuring Hyper-V Replica Broker for a Failover Cluster
  • Configuring Hyper-V Replica to use certificate-based authentication using an Enterprise CA
  • Using snapshots in virtual machines
• Chapter 9: Monitoring, Tuning, and Troubleshooting Hyper-V
  • Introduction
  • Using real-time monitoring tools
  • Using Perfmon for logged monitoring
  • Using VM Monitoring
  • Monitoring Hyper-V Replica
  • Using Resource Metering
  • Tuning your Hyper-V server
  • Using Event Viewer for Hyper-V troubleshooting
• Appendix: Hyper-V Architecture and Components
  • Understanding Hypervisors
  • Hyper-V architecture
  • Hyper-V architecture components
  • Differences between Hyper-V, Hyper-V Server, Hyper-V Client, and VMware

The good news is that Chapter 2 is available to download so you can have a look at the book concept and also be ready to migrate your current servers to Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V. To download the chapter, click here.

The book and ebook are available at http://www.packtpub.com/windows-server-2012-hypervisor-based-cookbook/book

You can also download the kindle version here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009OSQH9M/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_ask_Nz0gE.1B5SPHM

I hope you like it!

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

Hey folks.

On 3rd November, at the Microsoft Brisbane offices in the Brisbane CBD, a group of IT Pros formed by technical specialist, MVPs, Microsoft employees and other experts will be presenting the Infrastructure Saturday.

We will have a total of 14 sessions talking about Hyper-V, System Center 2012, Windows Server 2012, Windows 8, Group Policy, PowerShell, SharePoint, Exchange and Lync. from 9AM to 5:30PM.

I’ll be presenting 3 sessions with my mate Alessandro Cardoso:

• System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 SP1 – New Features and Improvements
• Making your Virtual Machines High Available with Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V
• Top 10 Reasons to Choose Microsoft Hyper-V

It’s all about virtualisation. That’s our tasks with these three sessions, which will cover all enhancements and new features of Hyper-V new version and System Center Virtual Machine 2012 SP1. We are preparing lots of cool Brazilian jokes demos and real world scenarios. It will be a great opportunity to keep up to date with all information you need about Microsoft virtualisation.

To view the list with all sessions, click here.

The event is totally free, but it requires registration, which can be completed here.

So if you are around in Brisbane that Saturday, just come up there.

See you there!

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

Veeam, one of the best backup software for Hyper-V, released a new product that support Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V virtual machines.

With an easy interface to backup your VMs on the fly, it supports compression, deduplication and the option to restore the VM in any other host.

The new version also has a free edition that supports backup compression, VM, VM file and file level recovery, file management and much more.

For more information, visit the website http://bit.ly/OmkKOW

Leandro Carvalho 
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | Technet Wiki Articles | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

Last week we had Teched Australia 2012 in Gold Coast.

For the second year I had the opportunity to participate with 2 Instructor-Led Labs talking about the Sideloading Windows 8 Applications and using App-V with SCCM 2012. I also presented a exam cram session full of tips and tricks to pass in the exam 70-247 – Configuring and Deploying a Private Cloud with System Center 2012. I got some very nice feedbacks and no problems with the timing during the presentations (last year my exam cram should be 60 minutes and I finished in 140 min )

This year we also had lots of sessions about Private Cloud and Windows Server 2012. A few Program Managers from US came to present a couple of sessions and we had amazing tracks covering all new features of Windows Server 2012, Windows 8 and System Center. Particularly I think the Hyper-V sessions with Ben Armstrong (Virtual PC Guy) were pretty cool.

I met lots of IT Pros, ex-students (chicken users), MVPs and Virtualisation Specialists. I definitely enjoyed every single day of the event.

Didn’t make Teched this year?! Not a problem… You can check all sessions online. They are available on http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/TechEd/Australia/2012

The party this year was full on! Lots of cool things such as laser tag, comedy shows, movies, balloon soccer (sort of) and much more. 

For my surprise I also won a helicopter flight and a limo lift. We had a flight around Gold Coast and I went to the airport taken by the limo. That was awesome!

Here are some pictures from the event.

		Teched Australia 2012 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

I reckon it was the best Teched Australia ever and I’m looking forward for next year.

Hopefully we can meet there again!

Cheers.

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | LinhadeCodigo | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

Hi there!

The System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 Beta for all products were released last week. It basically updates the current version of SC components to support Windows 8, Windows Server 2012 and their new features such as Network Virtualization, VHDX, Windows Store, etc.

Overview

The Beta of System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 (“SP1”) enables System Center customers to jointly evaluate System Center 2012 with Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8. The Beta is for evaluation purposes only and not to be used in production as described in the EULAs associated with the product. No license keys are required to do this evaluation. The Beta includes updates and enhancements to the following System Center 2012 components:

• Virtual Machine Manager
  • Improved Support for Network Virtualization
  • Extend the VMM console with Add-ins
  • Support for Windows Standards-Based Storage Management Service, thin provisioning of logical units and discovery of SAS storage
  • Ability to convert VHD to VHDX, use VHDX as base Operating System image
• Configuration Manager
  • Deployment and management of Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012
  • Distribution point for Windows Azure to help reduce infrastructure costs
  • Automation of administrative tasks through PowerShell support
  • Management of Mac OS X clients and Linux and UNIX servers
  • Real-time administrative actions for Endpoint Protection related tasks
• Data Protection Manager
  • Improved backup performance of Hyper-V over CSV 2.0
  • Protection for Hyper-V over remote SMB share
  • Protection for Windows Server 2012 de-duplicated volumes
  • Uninterrupted protection for VM live migration
• App Controller
  • Service Provider Foundation API to create and operate Virtual Machines
  • Support for Azure VM; migrate VHDs from VMM to Windows Azure, manage from on-premise System Center
• Operations Manager
  • Support for IIS 8
  • Monitoring of WCF, MVC and .NET NT services
  • Azure SDK support
• Orchestrator
  • Support for Integration Packs, including 3rd party
  • Manage VMM self-service User Roles
  • Manage multiple VMM ‘stamps’ (scale units), aggregate results from multiple stamps
  • Integration with App Controller to consume Hosted clouds
• Service Manager
  • Apply price sheets to VMM clouds
  • Create chargeback reports
  • Pivot by cost center, VMM clouds, Pricesheets
• Server App-V
  • Support for applications that create scheduled tasks during packaging
  • Create virtual application packages from applications installed remotely on native server

Download: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=34607

Information and Support for System Center 2012 Service Pack 1 Beta http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj628191

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | LinhadeCodigo | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc

After a busy week at Teched Australia, I’m finally back, trying to catch up all the releases and news.

Now that I have time to follow the updates, I’ve noticed lots of info about Windows Server 2012 that has been released last week. This new version comes with tons of features and improvements to run any workload in a cloud infrastructure. It doesn’t matter if you have public, private or hybrid clouds, Windows Server 2012 suits all of them and bring reliability, flexibility and manageability to your servers.

To help you getting all you need to get ready for Windows Server I created this list of links and resources that I think will be pretty handy. Check it out:

Download Windows Server 2012 – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/evalcenter/hh670538.aspx

Windows Server 2012 Blog – http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsserver/

Launch Event Videos – http://www.windows-server-launch.com/Home

Free Online Training on Microsoft Virtual Academy – http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/tracks/windows-server-2012-first-look

Free Microsoft Practice Exams – http://www.accelerated-ideas.com/aiMExamsChoose.aspx

More than 100 TechEd 2012 Hands-On Labs (Available till September 30th and requires sign-up for free) https://northamerica.msteched.com/signin?returnurl=/contentcatalog?sessiontype=hands-on%20lab&mtag=blog#fbid=qmYb-2g5yjm

Free ebook: Introduction to Windows Server 2012: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_press/archive/2012/09/05/free-ebook-introducing-windows-server-2012-rtm-edition.aspx

PowerPoint Presentation and Videos on TechEd Calalog – http://northamerica.msteched.com/contentcatalog?Keyword=&Categories=&Timeslot=&Speaker=&Day=&Start=&Finish=&oc=91938038-434d-e111-9562-001ec953730b&take=20&skip=-20&sort=start#fbid=qmYb-2g5yjm

Windows Server 2012 Technet Forums – http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/windowsserver

Windows Server 2012 Resource Webpage – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsserver/hh534429.aspx

PowerShell 3.0 Download - http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=34595

Download Hyper-V Server 2012 (Free Hyper-V version) – http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/hyper-v-server/

Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Architecture Poster – http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=29189

Atari Games for IE 10 http://arcade.atari.com/ (Come one, we also need some fun!)

Enjoy!

Leandro Carvalho
Certified Ethical Hacker | MCSA+S+M| MCSE+S | MCTS | MCITP | MCBMSS | MCT | MVP Virtual Machine
My Blog | MSVirtualization (pt-BR) | LinhadeCodigo | MVP Profile
Twitter: LeandroEduardo | LinkedIn: Leandroesc