Windows Server 2008 R2 on my mac book air!

This post is following a previous one I have a Mac..How bad is it doctor?
I installed Windows 7 RC, which was working great. Nevertheless, i needed to run a Windows Server 2008 R2 with hyper-V. As this one can't run inside a VM, i decided to install it on my MacBook Air.
The steps are easy but there is one critical event to not miss...Here we go:
Copy the BootCamp folder from MacOSX DVD to a usb key, this will be mandatory later!

Start under MacOSX. Through the bootcamp application, make hard drive space to Windows.
Boot on the Windows Server 2008 R2 DVD, and make a normal install.
As the first logon, you must immediately install the bootcamp drivers through the usb key (the external dvd drive is not yet working from windows). Fire up the msi directly. If you don't and restart or logoff, you won't be able to logon again, because the apple keyboard is not installed and so ctrl+alt+del won't work!
I had to connect an external usb keyboard to do it !

Then you just have to make Windows Server 2008 R2 looks like Windows 7 through powershell:
import-module servermanager
Add-WindowsFeature Desktop-Experience
Add-WindowsFeature Wireless-Networking
Add-WindowsFeature Net-Framework
Add-WindowsFeature Telnet-Client
Set-Service -name Themes -startuptype Automatic
shutdown /r /t 15 /c "reboot to make themes service working"

Then you just have to activate the Windows 7 theme.

Installing Hyper-V prevent the laptop from hibernate:
Sleep and hibernate power features are not available when you enable Hyper-V technology on a Windows Server 2008-based portable computer

So i added a boot option to load Windows without Hyper-V:
bcdedit /copy {current} /d "Microsoft Windows Server 2008 - without hypervisor"
bcdedit /set {GUID of the previous command} hypervisorlaunchtype off

SharePoint 2007 slowness

I recently had to solve 2 SharePoint 2007 slowness:

• The next call following application pool recycle : 2 minutes to get the page
  
• When searching for people in AD: a least 30 seconds

2 minutes to get the page

IIS tries to contact crl.microsoft.com through http, but can't. This is to verify assembly's signatures in the GAC. Causes and solutions are explained on this blog:

http://www.muhimbi.com/blog/2009/04/new-approach-to-solve-sharepoints.html

I chose the following one:

• Download CRL:
  • http://crl.microsoft.com/pki/crl/products/CodeSignPCA.crl
  • http://crl.microsoft.com/pki/crl/products/CodeSignPCA2.crl
• Add them to the store:
  • certutil -addstore CA CodeSignPCA.crl
  • certutil -addstore CA CodeSignPCA2.crl

Here we go, dropping load time to 20 seconds, which is "normal" since it has to compile again. But you can still go further by:

• Modify when the application pool is recycled
• Use SPWakeUp, to "warm up" the SharePoint engine by calling every site once

Search in AD : at least 30 seconds

When: you try to authorize a user, a group or just assign a task to someone. This takes around 30 seconds instead of one. I am targeting the time needed between the click and having the name underligned.

Causes: In my case, tracing the network activity of the server, i realized it was failing to contact domain controllers of another forest when i checked a user name. This try is due to the add of another forest in peoplepicker's property, through stsadm. By default, SharePoint only checks users in it's own domain. To extend the search to others domains or forest, you need to add them through this command:
stsadm -o setproperty -url http://SharePointSite:85 -pn peoplepicker-searchadforests –pv “domain1.com”,,;”domain2.com”,,

If you have trust between the SharePoint's domain and the targeted one, you don't have to provide credentials.

Here is a more detailled post: http://www.gk.id.au/2009/04/people-picker-sharepoint-and-forest.html

Solution: Allows SharePoint to connect to the domain controllers of these targets. The port to open is ldap (389) both in TCP and UDP.

That's it, it nows takes again around one second and we can now search people in the other forest!

BgInfo: error with success without success

I hadn't used bginfo from Sysinternals for a long time. As usual, i added the company logo as background, but here comes the surprise when saving:

(Error saving settings to registry: The operation completed sucessfully)

So we have an error saving to the reigstry, but the operation is a success...Amazing ? Obiously, disappointed few seconds later, no bgi file...

Context:

• Windows Vista SP1 32 bit
• Last bginfo (4.15)
• With and without privilege escalation (Why do we suspect immediately UAC?)

What can we do when a Sysinternal tool fails ? Use another Sysinternal tool for diagnostic!
Process monitor shows up an error for "insufficient resources":

Process explorer shows that the system is missing some resources (but still 742MB of available memory immediately)

I tried on my workstation with 8GB of ram, same..Windows XP ? same!

Finally, i reduced the picture before importing, and it worked great.

I sent a quick mail to Mark Russinovich…Feedback one hour later:

“Thanks for the bug report, Mathieu. It looks like Bginfo was trying to write 7MB to the registry.“

All you need to know on NLB

NLB (Network Load Balacing) from Microsoft have the advantage to come directly through the OS. As its name state, it allows to spread the load among many nodes, that are members of the farm (cluster). It's quick & easy to set up, or it looks like so, but there are many things to check if you want it to be more than appearing to work...

Network impact

NLB can works in two modes:

• Unicast
• Multicast (with or without IGMP)

Which one to pick ? It Depends! Things that make choose one:

• Which application will be used through the farm ? Does it support both mode ? For example, ISA 2006 only supported unicast until Service Pack 1 (a hotfix was available but not so famous)
  
• How many network cards do the nodes have ? Unicast will require 2 interfaces minimum to respect best practice.
  
• Do the nodes need to communicate between them ?
• Is the multicast filtering activated on the switches ? It prevent flooding the network
• Some switches (Cisco as example) do not stand at all to see the same mac address on the network from each node. You then have to convert your switch to hub, sending all packets to all farm members.
  

Monitoring & availability

It is true that if one node goes out of the network, the others will take its load over. But it's a full failure. If you have 2 nodes, and just stop your business application on one node, NLB will still send clients to it, and so you just lost half of your customers. NMB is layer 3 (IP), and so isn't aware at all of anything upper this layer. Even if the TCP port is not listened anymore. That's the pitfall of NLB. Microsoft included sentinel in the resource kit. It allowed to test a web page on each node and push it out of the farm if it's not working. ISA 2006 manage directly NLB, and can push a node out if ISA goes mad. So it's your duty to fill the gap. If it's a web site running through IIS, you can change a key in the metabase,LoadBalancerCapabilities to replace the 503 per a TCP reset. So the client will reconnect and send again its request, on another node.

To fill this gap, you can use your monitoring solution or a script looping on each node. The goal is to test each node from the application point of view, and push it out in case of error. Appliance load balancer (Alteon...) do the same, the industrial way. What you must take care:

• You must check nodes as often as possible, but without overloading them. The best is to include this monitoring need in the application, by including a special web page that will test for us the applications compponents (database access...) and then back the result through a code.
  
• Your monitoring becomes "active" (acting directly on the production by its own)
  

The Microsoft monitoring, SCOM, is interesting since you can act on trigger (eventlog, files...)

NLB versus MSCS ?

an MSCS cluster is meant to be active/passive. At anytime, resources are owned by only one node, which must be able to handle the full load. The good things is it can manage data, which are shared accross nodes and it monitors resources (state of windows services..). There again, it doesn't cover all case, especially when the application is there, but not answering anymore requests (database access lost...).

Other solution ?

• I already set up Safekit from Evidian on Windows. Not bad, but applications checks are still for you (how could it be the other way ?)
• Load balancer appliances (F5;Alteon...). As great as expensive...
• Keep with only one node ?
  

KB/Articles:

IIS Responses to Load-Balanced Application Pool Behaviors

NLB Operations Affect All Network Adapters on the Server

Unicast NLB nodes cannot communicate over an NLB-enabled network adaptor in Windows Server 2003

The “NLB troubleshooting overview for Windows Server 2003″ article is available

How to deploy a Secure Socket Tunneling Protocol (SSTP)-based VPN server that uses Network Load Balancing (NLB) in Windows Server 2008

An update enables multicast operations for ISA Server integrated NLB

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V virtual machines generate a Stop error when NLB is configured or when the NLB cluster does not converge as expected

Terminal Services Client Cannot Connect to NLB Cluster TCP/IP Address

The NLB WMI Provider Generates a Lot of Error Entries in the Wbemcore.log File

How NLB Hosts Converge When Connected to a Layer 2 Switch

Windows Server 2003-based NLB nodes in an NLB cluster cannot communicate with each other over an NLB network adapter

Servers in a Network Load Balancing (NLB) failover cluster cannot be used as print servers in Windows Server 2008

Network Load Balancing (NLB) clients cannot connect to the Windows Server 2008 NLB cluster by using the virtual IP address when NLB is running in multicast mode

The virtual IP address of a Windows Server 2008 NLB cluster is bound to the NetBIOS host name of a particular server or of multiple servers

I have a Mac..How bad is it doctor?

Those who read my blog for some time may get surprised, but i just bought a Mac! A MacBook Air, the one with an SSD of 128GB. My XPS M1210 is now quite old (2006) and didn't loose its weight since! Notebook with high performance (alienware..) are around 3 kilos minimum, so i stopped the rush to performance, as i can know connect to my hosted server to get the missing performances..

The good:

• It's really faster than my previous one. The CPU is lower, but the system bus upper than 1Ghz helps a lot, as having DDR3.
• The WiFi is really great, bandwidth climb immediately to the top of my ADSL access, with both MacOSX & Windows 7. The chip is a Broadcom 802.11n.
• The SSD is also great, close to my SuperTalent.
• Windows 7 64 bit RC get ready in 28 seconds.
• The keyboard is lighted
  

The not so good:

• I installed Windows 7 64 bit through Boot Camp. Windows is working great, but the Apple's drivers a lot less (see later in this post).
  
• MacOSX keeps the time in GMT (in bios). When Windows 7 boot, i then have 2 hours late. If Boot Camp get installed, it adds a time service to hide this difference (AppleTimesrv.exe)
• The graphic card memory is shared, so we have 1764MB of memory for Windows.
• No TPM, so no smart encryption with Windows 7.

SSD Performances:

Boot Camp drivers & Windows 7 64 bit:
By default, the setup stop immediately:
Now we have 2 ways:

• Change the MSI to skip this check, but Windows 7 alerts on issue with it...Safe to install?
• Apply directly drivers to device without Apple setup.

I chose the second way, that worked, but no Boot Camp control panel as i didn't install the Apple layer. That generates some issues:

• To switch to MacOSX, i have to hold "Alt" when powering on.
• No right click, neither multitouch, even with drivers.
• No access to shortcuts over F1-12.

Not having the right click by now is not funny at all. MacBook Air only have one USB port, so connecting an external mouse full time is not an option. (The Ethernet module need it too..)

So i choose to finally install Boot Camp anyway. The DVD i got with the laptop already contains Boot Camp version 2.1. As it won't let you going the smart way, we have to lie it a bit:

• Switch regional settings (Formats) to English (United States). Their MSI doesn't stand French at least, generating an error 2229.
• Launch the MSI directly from the DVD:\Boot Camp\Drivers\Apple\BootCamp64.msi
• If it's not enough, you will have to change the registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion from 6.1 to 6.0 to simulate Vista. To be put back after.

If you are having issue, here are some infos to help out:

Path to the Boot Camp control panel: C:\windows\system32\AppleControlPanel.exe

Drivers/services/shims launched by Apple at boot time:

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run:
Apple_KbdMgr Boot Camp Manager c:\program files\boot camp\kbdmgr.exe
IRW IR Receiver Application c:\windows\system32\irw.exe
RtHDVCpl HD Audio Control Panel Realtek Semiconductor c:\program files\realtek\audio\hda\ravcpl64.exe

HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services:
AppleOSSMgr c:\windows\system32\appleossmgr.exe
AppleTimeSrv c:\windows\system32\appletimesrv.exe
aapltctp Apple Trackpad Enabler c:\windows\system32\drivers\aapltctp.sys
aapltp Apple Trackpad Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\aapltp.sys
applebt Apple Bluetooth c:\windows\system32\drivers\applebt.sys
applemtm Apple Multitouch Mouse Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\applemtm.sys
applemtp Apple Multitouch Trackpad Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\applemtp.sys
AppleODD Apple Optical Disc Drive c:\windows\system32\drivers\appleodd.sys
AppleUSBEthernet Apple USB Ethernet Adapter Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\appleusbethernet.sys
DevUpper Apple iSight Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\isightft.sys
IRRemoteFlt IR Receiver Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\irfilter.sys
KeyAgent Apple KeyAgent Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\keyagent.sys
KeyMagic Apple Keyboard Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\keymagic.sys

Devices as they must appears:

Boot Camp must have a Trackpad tab among others:

Some tips:

• Right click: 2 fingers on the touchpad + trackpad button
• Page up/down: 2 fingers that go up or down on the touchpad (multitouch)
• Delete: Fn + backspace
• Choose OS at boot time: hold Alt key while powering on.

Hope it helps!

Going 64bit:: leader or last one ?

64 bit platform has been reserved for 'big system" during a long time, when a lot of memory or cpu math were needed. With the time being, it's now so common that any pretty current desktop /laptop can do 64 bit. Nevertheless, 64 bit keep used only when it's mandatory, as it's still not so obvious on what it brings. Microsoft put some pressure by supporting Exchange 2007 on 64 bit. As it's stalling, they add more pressure by supporting Windows 2008 R2 only on 64 bit.

Why do we put the brakes on 64 bit ?

• A lot of software editors don't offer a 64 bit version of teir products. So it will works, but through Wow64 to emulate 32 bit anyway.
• Drivers must be signed by Microsoft. Why ? Around 2 blue screen (BSOD) on 3 are due to bug in drivers. To be signed, a driver must pass some tests, to be considered as stable. You can even make these tests yourself by launching verifier. This is as simple as doing Start / Execute / verifier. Even if you are an admin and not a developper, you will want to use the developper scenario. Many checks are available:

You shouldn't activate these tests on all drivers, as you may not be able to boot again. Except if you are really confident on your drivers quality (or already signed)!

Some editors provide a 64bit version, but all processes are still 32 bit. It's just that their 32 bit version still works in 64 bit.

Apple, with Snow Leopard, finally make the big bang choice: they only provide a 64 bit version. iMacs and others won't have this new version, and editors will have to povide correct 64 bit versions.

Should you be a leader on 64 bit deployment ? I don't think so, except if you truly need it, as with all new technology. But, deploying 64 bit in 2009 doesn't make you a leader anymore! Ok, you still have to manage changes on your teams, a lot on the dev team. As i always recommend, think big but start small. Use new project to learn on 64 bit impacts.

Cygwin1.dll and the mysterious version problem

As i started computing on Linux/FreeBSD, I still my little habits to parse logs (awk/sed/cat/sort/uniq…).
Recently, cygwin, a Unix shell port on Windows, stopped working:

So there is a trouble with cygwin1.dll. Indeed, i am also using another tool, John the ripper, that has been ported to Windows through cygwin.
But the DLL for JTR is much older than the one included in my cygwin. Starting in the reverse order gives same result, except it's JTR that crash for same reason.

Procmon from Sysinternals confirm that each program load its own cygwin1.dll. But cygwin doesn't read the DLL file, instead it just do a "Load image". JTR does it, but after reading the DLL file:

Process Explorer helps me to point out the root cause. Cygwin1.dll uses a section type handle that have the same name, anyway which version of the DLL is used.

Handles for JTR:

Handles for cygwin itself (bash.exe)

I could confirm the diagnostic using a feature of Process Explorer: close an handle inside a process:

The cygwin shell is now working while JTR is also running. The thing is that i don't what could be the consequences in JTR:

The case of the driver leaking handles - Marvell Yukon Service

I noticed that one of my process, rundll32, was leaking handles thanks to Process Explorer, a sysinternal tool. Rundll32 is a Windows hosting process, so it's the process hosted inside that is leaking. Hopefully Process explorer says who is behind by just overlaping the cursor:
So the hosted service is Marvell Yukon Service (yksvc), used by my network card. To find what sort of handle is leaking, i added the lower pane inside Process explorer by pressing crtl +L. Scrolling down, i found a lot of mutant, always on the same object, \BaseNameObjects\NetCfgWriteLock. All new handle are highlighted in green, so i found out that it keeps opening a new handle every second or so:
A right click allows to get its property:
As Mark always recommend, i checked my driver version, which is a bit old:
A newer version is available on the Marvell support page, so i decided to give it a try.
Before doing the driver update, i used perfmon on my system to check the handle behavior before and after the upgrade. It confirmed that the bug is now resolved:
Thanks to mark tools & tutorial, this problem is gone :)

my migration to Google Apps: the good, the bad and the ugly...

Bored ? Migrate to Google Apps to shake your brain!

As input, i had:

• One Gmail account(2Gb of mails ; agenda ; reader ; contacts)
• One pop account
  
• my domain (lotp.fr) with my main email forwarded to the pop account
  

As output… Everything in Google Apps using my domain

Activation of Google Apps for your own domain is really simple and fast (< 15mn)…Up to now, rock & roll !
Of course, it would be great if it could just import the Gmail account into Google Apps… But if it was the case, i wouldn't be blogging about it !

The good…

• Works immediately
• No Credit card asked
  
• We can change the url to a more friendly one, likewebmail.mydomain.com
• Google Labs is still there, with all same addons as Gmail
  
• Having Google mail servers as frontend for incoming mail reduce a lot spam (compared to the forwarding solution i had before)

The bad…

• Google doesn't give any way to migrate Gmail content to Google Apps. It's a shame! Even GoogleEmailUploader given by Google exclude Gmail account as source…Yes, it's not a bug, it's a feature! I used the way explained here : synchro of the 2 accounts through imap protocol with an open source tool named imapsync. The thing is that you need the best Internet connection you can and a Linux in hand. Using my hosted server, it did 2Gb in 3 hours. Globally, it's all goods, maybe except one or two attached files that became corrupted!! Don't be afraid, the source mailbox isn't changed neither emptied, so you can just keep it at hand for some months in case..
• For your contacts and calendar, you will have to do a 2 way steps, synching the old account with a local mail client, and then the client with the new account.

The ugly…

• No Google Reader! That's really ugly when you have 300 rss sources... Don't cry, there is a workaround! You have to create a new google Reader, using your google apps account (same login/pass). Then export and import your rss feeds. You still don't have the link to Google Reader from Google Apps, and you still have to logon again on google Reader.
  
• Looks like people had more space on Google Apps than Gmail before. I have the same amount as my Gmail account...In fact, i even have 1Mb more on Gmail than my Google Apps account . Except if you switch to the Premier edition with 25Gb

Up to now, i am very satisfied with the service, especially for a free service! I would be ready to for more space in Google Documents (same space as a Gmail account) and Google Reader integrated.

UPDATE: I finally decided to use Google Email Uploader on my 64 bit desktop. It does not find any mailbox to upload (outlook, thunderbird, same problem). My luck is that a braveful guy spent the time to understand why and make a working version for 64 bit, working for me: http://blog.insanegenius.com/2009/01/google-email-uploader-on-vista-x64.html

how to reset domain admin password on a Windows Server 2008

I did not use my tests Virtual Machines for some times just after installing them....I forgot the domain admin password :'(
I found a hack for Vista, that i reused for my Windows Server 2008 Domain controller !
I just pushed it a litlle further by only using the official Windows Server 2008 DVD from Microsoft instead of backtrack :)

For people in hurry, here are the steps:

• Boot onto DVD of Windows Server 2008
• Choose “Repair your computer”
• Launch cmd
• Go to c:\windows\system32
• Rename Utilman.exe to Utilman.exe.bak
• Copy cmd.exe to Utilman.exe
• Reboot on Windows
• Do the keyboard shortcut Windows + U when on the logon screen
• net user administrator Newpass123 inside the cmd
• log on with the domain admin account and this new pass
• change the password to remember it if needed
• Reboot on the DVD to put back the original Utilman.exe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ar-VoO9ogHc

Management Pack Dell: Regional settings bug

[Update: Dell will only deliver a 4.0 with this bug corrected. No intermediate release. We signed an NDA to get a hand on the 4.0 beta, but i left the company before having it. The 4.0 should be released by the end of july.]

I have an open issue with the Dell Management Pack and our regional settings. I found out the bug, the resolution, but now Dell ask me to wait for the MP V4.0 because i am the only one to report this bug.

I guess that we are not the only one to have this bug, and it's about people not going through opening a case at Dell. I will expose the issue here, hoping others will realize they are affected too. My goal is to have Dell releasing a corrected version before 4.0 that will be out in months.

The Bug is for DellStorageDiscovery.vbs:

Source: Health Service Modules
Event number: 21405

The process started at 09:29:38 failed to create System.Discovery.Data, no errors detected in the output. The process exited with 0 Command executed: "C:\WINDOWS\system32\cscript.exe" /nologo "DellStorageDiscovery.vbs" {XXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXX} {XXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXX} agent.mydomain.com Working Directory: C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\Health Service State\Monitoring Host Temporary Files 1\1821\ One or more workflows were affected by this. Workflow name: Dell.Connections.DellStorage.Discovery Instance name: agent.mydomain.com Instance ID: {XXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXX} Management group: FIRSTMG

------
The badly function is (in red the problem):
Function CheckVBScriptEngine()
Dim bIsCompatV, var
Const VBSCRIPT_MIN_VERSION = 5.6
var = ScriptEngineMajorVersion & “.” & ScriptEngineMinorVersion
If (CInt(var)) < biscompatv =" False" biscompatv =" True"> 0 Then
CheckVBScriptEngine = Err.Number
Else
CheckVBScriptEngine = bIsCompatV
End If
End Function

The corrected function is:
Function CheckVBScriptEngine()
Dim bIsCompatV, var, sep, WshShell
Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject(”WScript.Shell”)
sep = WshShell.RegRead(”HKCU\Control Panel\International\sDecimal”)
Const VBSCRIPT_MIN_VERSION = 5.6
var = ScriptEngineMajorVersion & sep & ScriptEngineMinorVersion
If (CInt(var)) < biscompatv =" False" biscompatv =" True"> 0 Then
CheckVBScriptEngine = Err.Number
Else
CheckVBScriptEngine = bIsCompatV
End If
End Function

PS: I also have a similar bug with the Microsoft ISA 2006 Management Pack. Microsoft acknowleged the bug and is going to deliver a new release.

SCOM/OPSMGR: Web Application: Untrusted CA

Context:

• You created a web application which use https (SSL)
• The checkbox “monitor SSL health” is checked
• When you log on the watcher node and call the same pages, you don't have any security alert through internet explorer
• You do have the following error:

Cause:
You are missing a certificate on the chaine. Your user account has the full chaine, but not the computer account. In my case, i had to add a Verisign (Class 3) certificate for the local computer account:
…And alerts are gone! We could just uncheck the health monitoring of certificate, but it's always better to get notified when it's expired

OpsMgr/Scom: error 2130771918 on all TCP & web applications

After installing a SCOM hotfix with errors, all TCP and web applications monitors stopped working with always the same error: 2130771918. For example, even a TCP test on the RMS itself failed:
After opening a call to MS, they give us the patch for KB 957511. We are not concerned by this KB but it contains a more recent version of DLL Momnetworkmodules.dll, which does TCP and web applications tests. Once this dll updatedn the problem was gone.

By the way it could have been necessary to register again this dll with:

regsvr32 “c:\program files\system center operations manager 2007\momnetworkmodules.dll”

Web site: security or index, do we need to choose ?

Many web sites gives content based on questions/answers. Answering a question can even be paid, to keep people motivated to answer.

To have their business running, these sites often ask to register and pay to access the content....
But, to have visitors and so customers, theses questions and answers must be indexed by search engine like google.
You can't give google an account to log on your site to index it. So these web sites filters access based on the user agent coming to them, and if it's a known search engine, then they give full access to the content. So when a visitor find a page with the same question it has through google, they filter the answers because the user agent is not a search engine.

This form of security can be easily circumvented by changing your user agent to googlebot or others. Very easy, even for dummies like with the firefow extension, User Agent Switcher!

If you are too lazy to find the exact name of search engine, you can feed this extension with this ready to use XML:
http://techpatterns.com/downloads/firefox/useragentswitcher.xml

For example, the web site SQL Server Central use this false security.

To have a real security, you need to filter User Agent AND IP address

ESXi inside VmWare Workstation

If you want to try out vmware ESXi inside VmWare workstation, you have two things to look after:

• Set the CPU to Intel-V or AMD-V

• monitor_control.restrict_backdoor="true"

If you don't put this line in the VMX, you will get this error:

(You many not power on a virtual machine in a virtual machine.)

This means that ESXi detect it's running inside a VM and won't let you start a VM.

For those that understand my native french language, i published a step by step video on how to set this up from: