Networknet.nl

Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) allows ESX Server 3 administrators to determine which Cisco switch port is connected to a given vSwitch. When CDP is enabled for a particular vSwitch, you can view properties of the Cisco switch (such as device ID, software version, and timeout) from the VI Client. You can use the service console command-line interface to enable CDP.

Using this information and without going to the server room and locating the network cable in the rack I was able to configure the interface on the switch real time.

The switchport should be set as trunk and for security reasons also configure the allowed vlan’s.

interface GigabitEthernet0/15
description ** ESX-01 Trunk port LAN **
switchport trunk allowed vlan 1,200
switchport mode trunk
spanning-tree portfast
!

ESX 3i host server has sensors builtin that allows you to monitor the health of the following host components:

CPU processors
Memory
Fans
Temperature
Voltage

On systems without IPMI, only CPU sensors are available. Storage sensors are available only on systems with an LSI MegaRAID controller installed. If a particular component cannot be monitored on a given host, that component does not appear.

Screenshot of my Dell PowerEdge 2900 series server.

CIM-based framework & SNMP are available for hardware monitoring in ESX 3i. For more information check out this document.