Virtually Boring

VMware Guest Customization – Could not parse or process the unattend answer file

April 21, 2026February 16, 2016 by Daniel Boring

While deploying a virtual machine from template I received an error when guest customization was running:

Windows could not parse or process the unattend answer file for pass [specialize]. The settings specified in the answer file cannot be applied. The error was detected while processing settings for components [Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup].

Per VMware KB 2008221 a ‘wrong product key‘ could cause this. Coincidentally I created and used a brand new Guest Customization for this deployment. Turned out I used a Server 2012 Datacenter KMS key instead of the Server 2012 R2 Datacenter KMS key (Microsoft KMS Keys). I deleted the VM and redeployed after correcting the Guest Customization thus solving the problem!

Upgrade to Veeam Availability Suite v9

April 21, 2026January 14, 2016 by Daniel Boring

It is finally here! Veeam Availability Suite v9 is released and is ready for deployment. You can upgrade your current installation as long as you are running Backup & Replication 7.0 Patch 4 through version 8.0 (any patch level) and for Veeam ONE version 7.0 & 8.0. In this post I will be upgrading my v8 installation to v9.

What’s New:

There are many new features added in v9, check out the links below to see whats new:

Deploying Veeam Availability Suite – Veeam ONE

April 21, 2026January 11, 2016 by Daniel Boring

Veeam Availability Suite contains a backup & replication solution (Veeam Backup & Replication) and a monitoring & reporting tool (Veeam ONE). In this post I will be deploying Veeam ONE Monitoring and configuring it to monitor my VMware vCenter environment.

Veeam ONE - Typical Deployment — Typical Deployment

Deploying Veeam Availability Suite – Backup & Replication

April 21, 2026December 27, 2015 by Daniel Boring

Veeam Availability Suite contains a backup & replication solution (Veeam Backup & Replication) and a monitoring & reporting tool (Veeam ONE). I wanted to try out a few backup solutions in my lab environment and decided to start with Veeam due to the popularity and ease of use. In this post I will be deploying Backup & Replication and configuring a backup job.

Updating vCenter Server Appliance 6.0 to Update 1 & 1b

April 21, 2026November 30, 2015 by Daniel Boring

VMware released vSphere 6.0 Update 1 on September 10th, 2015 and Update 1b on January 7th, 2016. In this post i’ll go through how to upgrade VCSA 6.0 to Update 1 & 1b.

In my environment I have the Platform Services Controller [PSC] embedded with the VCSA. If you deployed an external PSC separately from vCenter then this post will still work for you! The upgrade procedure is the exact same on both the vCenter and PSC just upgrade the PSC first before vCenter.

vCenter Server Appliance 6.o Update 1 Release Notes:

Customer Experience Improvement Program: The Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) provides VMware with information that enables VMware to improve the VMware products and services and to fix problems. When you choose to participate in CEIP, VMware will collect technical information listed below about your use of the VMware products and services in CEIP reports on a regular basis. This information does not personally identify you. For more details, see the vSphere Documentation Center.
Feature Enhancement: Suite UI is now enabled by default for the vSphere Web Client.
Support for SSLv3: Support for SSLv3 has been disabled by default.
vCSA Authentication for Active Directory: VMware vCenter Server Virtual Appliance (vCSA) has been modified to only support AES256-CTS/AES128-CTS/RC4-HMAC encryption for Kerberos authentication between vCSA and Active Directory.
Hybrid Cloud Manager: Hybrid Cloud Manager has been updated for vSphere, and can be accessed directly from the home page of vSphere Web Client.
FT-vSAN Interoperability: vSAN and FT work together.
Appliance Management user interface: Appliance Management has a new user interface, written in HTML5.
Backup and Restore with external PSC: vCenter Server deployments with external PSC, also called MxN have support for backup and restore.
Platform Services Controller UI: The Platform Services Controller now provides UI option to view, renew and replace certificates. For more details see Explore Certificate Stores from the Platform Services Controller Web Interface
Installation and Upgrade using HTML 5 installer: The following installation and upgrade scenarios are supported for vCenter Server using HTML 5 installer:
- Installation using HTML 5 installer and target as vCenter Server is supported
- Upgrade using HTML 5 installer and target as vCenter Server is not supported
- Upgrade using command line and target as vCenter Server is supported
Resolved Issues: This release of vCenter Server 6.0 Update 1 addresses issues that have been documented in the Resolved Issues section.
Full release notes can be found here

vCenter Server Appliance 6.o Update 1b Release Notes:

ESXi 6.0 Update 1b enables support for TLS versions 1.1 and 1.2 for most of the vSphere components without breaking the previously supported compatibility/interoperability. Some of the vSphere components that still support only TLS version 1.0 are listed here:
- vSphere Client
- Virtual SAN Observer on vCenter Server Appliance (vCSA)
- Syslog on vCSA
- Auto Deploy on vCSA
- Auto Deploy/iPXE
The ESXi 6.0 Update 1b now supports all TLS versions 1.0, 1.1, and 1.2 with the exceptions listed above. See Knowledge base article 2136185 for the list of supported TLS protocols.
Support for the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) with 128/256-bit key length is added for RPC header authentication in the NFS 4.1 Client.
Note: See resolved Security Issues section for more information.
This release of ESXi 6.0 Update 1b addresses issues that have been documented in the Resolved Issues section.
Full release notes can be found here

Microsoft WMI – Invalid Class Error [0x80041010]

April 21, 2026November 19, 2015 by Daniel Boring

You can receive error 0x80041010 from multiple applications that call WMI. For my example it was received in SCCM while patches were being applied.

No matter where you got the error the underlying issue is probably with WMI. Here is how to check!

Setup RD Gateway Role on Windows Server 2012 R2

April 21, 2026November 19, 2015 by Daniel Boring

The Remote Desktop Gateway [RDG] role enables you to access your RDS environment remotely over 443.

Remote Desktop Serivces - Gateway Role — RDS Architecture

Setup RD Licensing Role on Windows Server 2012 R2

April 21, 2026November 18, 2015 by Daniel Boring

Once you have an Remote Desktop Services [RDS] environment setup and want to continue using it past the 120 day trial period you will need to setup the RD Licensing role. This blog post will document how to setup the role, activate the license server with Microsoft, add a license key, then configure RDS with the license.

Remote Desktop Serivces - Licensing Role — RDS Architecture

Setup Remote Desktop Services in Windows Server 2012 R2

April 21, 2026November 13, 2015 by Daniel Boring

Microsoft Remote Desktop Services [RDS] allows users to access centralized applications and workstations in the data center remotely. Microsoft RDS is the new expanded and renamed Microsoft Terminal Services. In this post I will document the implementation of RDS in my home lab using an ‘all-in-one’ configuration.

vBoring Blog Series:

A General System Error Occurred: Cannot get user info

April 21, 2026October 26, 2015 by Daniel Boring

After a fresh deployment of the vCenter Server Appliance 6 (VCSA) I got the error below when using “Use Windows session credentials” check box on the thick and web client. After some searching I found VMware KB 2050701 which states this is a known issue affecting vCenter Server Appliance 5.1, 5.5, and 6.0.