Core mode of Windows Server 2016 TP3 – Remote Management Tip

Microsoft just released technical preview 3 of Windows Server 2016, it’s catching up VMware on SDDC. I can see a lot of enhancement in the new version. A stable hypervisor is prerequisite of SDDC but it’s weakness of Microsoft. You have to patch and reboot frequently, some organizations even have regular reboot schedules. Microsoft introduced core mode on Windows Server 2008, it much enhanced on Windows Server 2012 R2. But Windows Server 2012 R2 aims to SBM. I didn’t think SBM organizations really need that if you compare operation complexity of core mode with GUI.

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How to configure nested Hyper-V VM on VMware Workstation

First, I would like to recommend DELL M4800 for small home lab, I spent lot of time to looking for a solution for my lab, I need some hardware low noise, low weight, and it is better portable. I checked out HP mini server, Apple MAC mini, Mac book pro…etc. They are nice products to show best design of IT industry, but no one perfect. Finally I choose DELL M4800. The reason is RAM can be upgraded to 32GB. 3 SSD hard disks is supported, you can install one native SSD, one in CD-ROM slot, another msata SSD in WAP slot. SSD disk is must have for IT LAB, it can provide you more than 10K IOPS without significant performance degrade.

Okay, back to topic…if you want to testing Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V on lab, you probably prefer install it on a VM of VMware Workstation. You have to follow up proper steps to make sure the Hyper-V functionally.

After you create Hyper-V VM:

Keep VM power off status.
Go to Settings of VM.
Highlight Processors.
Select Virtualize Intel VT-x/EPT or AMD-V/RVI option.
Go to Options tab.
Highlight General.
Select Microsoft Windows.
Select Hyper-V on drop-list.
Power on.

Error 12711 VMM cannot complete the WMI operation on the server because of an error

Finally I implemented Hyper-V 2012 and SCVMM 2012 R2 on my lab, unfortunately FreeNAS does not supports SCSI-3 persistent reservation of Windows Server 2012 R2, you can refer bug #4003. It lead to my iSCSI storage cannot be brought online in Failover Cluster. I have to find out alternative.

I decided to use Windows Server File Server instead of iSCSI eventually. There are bunch of benefit to use that to leverage new SMB 3.0 technology. Key is it supports high available.

Followed the guide I successful created first shares for Hyper-V cluster, I created a testing VM but cannot power it on. It show me:

Error (12711)
VMM cannot complete the WMI operation on the server (dcahyv02.contoso.com) because of an error: [MSCluster_Resource.Name="SCVMM test (1)"] The cluster resource could not be brought online by the resource monitor.

The cluster resource could not be brought online by the resource monitor (0x139A)

Recommended Action
Resolve the issue and then try the operation again.

I went to cluster service manager on a Hyper-V host, event logs show me:

Cluster resource ‘SCVMM test (1)’ of type ‘Virtual Machine’ in clustered role ‘SCVMM test Resources (1)’ failed. The error code was ‘0x80004005’ (‘Unspecified error’).

Based on the failure policies for the resource and role, the cluster service may try to bring the resource online on this node or move the group to another node of the cluster and then restart it. Check the resource and group state using Failover Cluster Manager or the Get-ClusterResource Windows PowerShell cmdlet.

Initially I suspected that’s a problem of new file server, or SCVMM bug. But problem was it cannot be brought up even I created a VM on Hyper-V host directly. It gave me this error:

Virtual machine ‘test’ could not be started because the hypervisor is not running (Virtual machine ID AE786CAA-C74B-4F9E-8867-30191197087B). The following actions may help you resolve the problem: 1) Verify that the processor of the physical computer has a supported version of hardware-assisted virtualization. 2) Verify that hardware-assisted virtualization and hardware-assisted data execution protection are enabled in the BIOS of the physical computer. (If you edit the BIOS to enable either setting, you must turn off the power to the physical computer and then turn it back on. Resetting the physical computer is not sufficient.) 3) If you have made changes to the Boot Configuration Data store, review these changes to ensure that the hypervisor is configured to launch automatically.

Hypervisor is not running… it indicates something related to virtualization layer. I finally realized that I was running Hyper-V host on VMware Workstation on a laptop, it’s twice nested VM, something wrong!

I followed my article How to configure nested Hyper-V VM on VMware Workstation to fix this problem.