N40L Remote Access Card + ESXI (OSX)

mkelbie

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Have I wasted £70?

I used a MacBook as my daily machine, at least for now anyway but I have had a N40L for a while now and haven't used it because the lack of a vSphere client in OSX.

I got a 8GB stick of ram and a USB stick to install ESXI 5.5 and the plan was to have a few different VMs on a 120GB+ SSD like Ubuntu and a OSX server for time machine. Possibly even some WindowsServer installs for testing but it all fell flat when I didn't check for OSX support.

I then bought a HP RSA card for £70 which I was hoping would help manage my N40L better and also allow me to control my ESXI setup remotely so I can turn on/off different virtual machines but I am having issues getting the virtual KVM to even work on OSX.

Looks like a problem with Java but even if I do manage to get it working it's not going to do what I want is it?

Tempted to give up and sell my N40L now as the upgrades so far have cost more than I paid for the box and I'm not even finished :-/

Anyone got the remote card in their box and is it worth the £70 for ESXI or should I return it or Amazon whilst I can.

Thanks
 
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I then bought a HP RSA card for £70 which I was hoping would help manage my N40L better and also allow me to control my ESXI setup remotely so I can turn on/off different virtual machines but I am having issues getting the virtual KVM to even work on OSX.

Why is it that you using an add in card to do that...? IIRC ESXi lets you do that anyway, either using vCentre (if you have it) of using a web interface direct into the host via a web interface (which is more limited functionality but lets you stop & start vGuests.)

You're right about OSX - Apple have always been reluctant to play nice with anyone else and won't release their O/S for visualization. There were rumours a few years ago that they might be changing their mind, but thus far it doesn't seem like they want to let go of their babies.
 
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Why is it that you using an add in card to do that...? IIRC ESXi lets you do that anyway, either using vCentre (if you have it) of using a web interface direct into the host via a web interface (which is more limited functionality but lets you stop & start vGuests.)

You're right about OSX - Apple have always been reluctant to play nice with anyone else and won't release their O/S for visualization. There were rumours a few years ago that they might be changing their mind, but thus far it doesn't seem like they want to let go of their babies.

I didn't think I could use ESXI at all with OSX? So I can manager new and existing VMs from my Mac? The extra features of having a remote card aren't worth the £70 so I may return it.

I don't mind not having a virtual OSX machine. Just want to be able to control ESXI from my mac remotely because I remote on to the OS fine without the card, just can't manage the VMs.

Should I return it?

Thanks
 
ESXi wont give you much remoted in (not like say if you had installed a windows OS on your N40), unless you really like Command line stuff :) you need to setup a vcenter/vsphere appliance. I dont know about the MAC side of things but could you setup a Virtual Windows PC on your MAC then get the vsphere client installed on the Virtual windows PC?
 
All I want to do is be able to turn on or install a new VM which at the moment I can't do. Once I have done that I can use RDP to connect to my server vm.

I am returning the remote access card
 
If I'm reading you right, you have an Apple Mac workstation and an HP MicroServer (apologies, I mis-understood you earlier) Correct..?

Here's my "freebie" way of running virtualisation. I don't use ESXi. I run up a MicroServer under a Linux Mint O/S (I chose Mint not because I wanted to "do virtualisation," but for other reasons - not least because it's free and Mint has a "Windows" like GUI.)

Linux Mint avails remote access using VNC and/or RDP. (Not out of the box, but it's available for free.) So that allows me to "remote control" the "box."

I run VMWare Player (also free) on the Mint box to host the vGuests. OK, it technically may be a bit slower than ESXi, but it suits my needs as combining both a file server, DLNA server, NMT and VM server and a few other things in the same box and to use my VGuests on an ad-hoc basis, it's good for me.

I install VNC or RDP in my vGuests and the my client PC can't tell it's not talking to a "physical" machine, which is of course the point of doing this.

I don't know Mac real well, but I'd be surprised if your couldn't find either/or VNC/RDP client for Mac.

I'd be happy to discus in more detail if you like.
 
Its a macbook but yes its like my workstation until I build my hackintosh.

So you boot into mint and thats what runs on your HP box?

Microsoft have an official RDP client so I am sorted there.

I will have a look into this option and see if it suits my needs.


My aims are;

Ubuntu image for my sabnzb server

FreeNas for data & Time Machine backups for my mac

Window XP/7 or maybe 8 for Windows dev/testing

Server 2008/2012 for SQL and training.

I won't be running all at once, freenas & ubunut maybe 24/7 but the windows OS will be as and when I need them which is why I want to be able to boot them from my mac.

Appreciate your help and I am sorry if i wasn't clear what I wanted
 
So you boot into mint and thats what runs on your HP box?

Yep: I did that because I wanted to "explore" using of a "WAFL" like file system (called ZFS) and needed a "free" Linux O/S to do so. Everything else was bonus, but I've got nothing to complain about so far.

Forgive me, but at time of posting, I'm outside toooo much alcohol to be truely professional, but check in tomorrow and I'll be more sober/hungover and professional.

s'Good that you 'state you aims,' - it really helps us tell you what you need. (hic)
 
I am just about to start using my N40L and I have had to install windows 8 on fusion just so I can install vsphere and access my esxi server.

Do i have no other options then to install/remove turn on virtual machines?
 
Do i have no other options then to install/remove turn on virtual machines?

I'm not sure what version of ESXi you're using, but with the Vsphere client and ESXi 5.1 you can re-configure VMs, checkpoint them, revert to checkpoints, monitor and start/stop/pause them. What else did you want to do ?
 
I was using esxi 5.5 but I have just removed it.

Currently just booting straight into 2012R2 now and use hyper v for VMs and I am going to try and set up everything I need just on the 2012R2 which is SQL server, IIS, FTP/NAS, sabnzb with things like xbmc, couch potato and sick beard.

I much prefer esxi but the issue I had was 5.5 was free and if I wanted to use the web client to manage the server on a mac I would need a paid version, likewise I couldn't do very much on the iPad app either. Vsphere only works on windows and I don't currently have a windows a machine, I don't have a mac now (temporarily) so I wouldn't have been able to do anything so I removed esxi and opted for 2012r2.

Once I build a new pc and have better access I may switch back to esxi because it performed great but I will see how I get on with hyper v first.
 

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