PerfectDisk Blog from Raxco.com| Defrag Software

Your defrag App Store -- Tips & Tricks for Advanced Users

                           

We know that there are always some things that you wish you could do with PerfectDisk, but they just are not built into the application, at least yet. That's why we have a few tips and tricks for you advanced users that can help you do a little more.

Things like turning off the PerfectDisk services or shutting down the operating system after PerfectDisk runs, or modifying the way the PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console links to an Active Directory OU.

PerfectDisk 10 Tips and Tricks for the client can be found here. PerfectDisk 10 Tips and Tricks for the Enterprise Console can be found here. And they can both be accessed from the PerfectDisk 10 Updates and Downloads page.

These tools are for advanced users and are provided "as is."

Do a little more.

                        

Webinar -- Managing PerfectDisk 10 in the Enterprise

 

We're holding a free Webinar on Tuesday, April 21st at 12:00 p.m. noon EDT (9:00 a.m. PDT). The Webinar, Managing PerfectDisk 10 in the Enterprise, will cover:

• what's new in the PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console
• setup, deployment and management of PerfectDisk 10 clients

• patent-pending Virtual Awareness for boosting performance of virtualization environments, including VMware ESX. Microsoft's Hyper-V and other Windows-based hosts.

The webinar is only about a half-hour but still provides some excellent hands-on tips that you will be able to put into use. For existing business customers who have not yet deployed PerfectDisk 10, it's a great opportunity to see what's new, particularly those in or moving to virtualization environments. And for new customers or those considering PerfectDisk, it's a good opportunity to spend a little time and learn a lot.

The Webinar will be given by senior technical support engineer Erwin Solis and moderated by Greg Hayes, manager of technical solutions at Raxco Software.

You can register here.

Virtualization defrag for the future -- here today -- Go

                            

The future of virtualization defragmentation arrives today, with the general availability of the world's first and only virtually-aware disk defragmentation utility. The PerfectDisk 10 Virtual Enterprise Edition is now generally available. This newest member of the PerfectDisk family contains patent-pending Virtual Awareness that eliminates resource contention to maintain optimal performance on physical hosts. And it is platform independent on VMware ESX Server and Windows-based physical hosts such as Microsoft's Hyper-V.

                         

Since the Release Candidate of the Virtual Enterprise Edition was made available about a month ago, interest from businesses and agencies has really taken off. What's the big deal? What the competition offers is defragmentation that is always on, always going....but unaware of its environment. So a common scenario in that environment is a virtual machine, or 2, or several, that kick off defragmentation because they are "idle." The problem is that these "idle" guests start going to work and consuming resources. but they don't take into account that another guest under the same physical host may not be idle - and in fact may need to carry out important work. But it's impeded by the "idle" guests that are cranking away, consuming resources at the expense of a critical machine that needs to do other work. 

                     

Enter the PerfectDisk 10 Virtual Enterprise Edition. It's the next generation of intelligence, which not only concerns itself with the resource availability of individual machines, but of their physical hosts as well. Plus all the other extras with PerfectDisk 10, like space management reports, patented optimization, space restoration technology, etc.

                     Also available today is the new PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console (formerly the Command Center). The PD 10 console brings new virtualization reporting as well as other new reports and reporting enhancements. Plus - new integration with VMware Virtual Infrastructure Management. This new plug-in allows user to access the PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console directly from within the VMware Virtual Infrastructure Client, providing a single point of management for their ESX-based/vCenter managed Windows guests.

                          

And the console also has new integration with Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007. The SCOM 2007 management pack allows users to access PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console fragmentation statistics - including alerts and warnings - directly from within the SCOM 2007 console, providing a single point of management for their managed Windows environment. Using the PerfectDisk Enterprise Console SCOM 2007 management pack, users can drill down to the drive level to view fragmentation levels, view an aggregate summary of alerts and warnings, connect to PerfectDisk running on a managed computer, and even directly launch the Enterprise Console to deploy, configure and schedule PerfectDisk on their managed computers. And finally, the PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console now includes SQL Server 2005 Express Edition for improved performance and scalability.

Virtualization defragmentation with VMware ESX Server, Microsoft's Hyper-V, and more. Total enterprise management of defragmentation.

                  

Now.

Enterprise Console and SCOM integration

                          

System Center Operations Manager 2007 (SCOM) provides end-to-end service management that is easy to customize and extend for improved service levels across an IT environment. This enables operations and IT management teams to identify and resolve issues affecting the health of distributed IT services.

The PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console SCOM 2007 management pack allows users to access PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console fragmentation statistics - including alerts and warnings - directly from within the SCOM 2007 console, providing a single point of management for their managed Windows environment. Using the PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console SCOM 2007 management pack, users can drill down to the drive level to view fragmentation levels, view an aggregate summary of alerts and warnings, connect to PerfectDisk running on a managed computer, and even directly launch the Enterprise Console to deploy,configure and schedule PerfectDisk on their managed computers.

The PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console beta test has just concluded, and it will be made generally available next week.

More integration with 10.

                      

VMware vCenter Server Plug-in

                               VMware's vCenter Server (formerly VMware VirtualCenter) provides pretty robust virtualization management for VMware Infrastructure environments. It's a big help for administrators trying to manage and automate their VMware environments.

With the new PerfectDisk 10 Enterprise Console, we provide a plug-in from the PerfectDisk console directly into the vCenter Server. This allows VMware datacenters to enhance their automated datacenter operations with even better central managment. From the vCenter Server, administrators can directly access the PerfectDisk Enterprise Console and all the information capabilities available through it.

                                  

Part of our ongoing commitment to all virtualization defrag and our growing partnership with VMware.

Enhanced control at the console including virtualization

                                    

The PerfectDisk Command Center has provided enterprises with the central management necessary to deploy, configure, manage and report on defragmentation across their workstation and server networks. The many customizable alerts and warnings, remote management, and advanced reporting have made the Command Center a key piece of enterprises utilizing PerfectDisk.

With the next version, the Command Center gets a new name -- Enterprise Console -- to more accurately describe this component of the PerfectDisk family. Included are new configuration management and configuration reporting to allow administrators to more easily create and assign configuration profiles and report on configurations used. Also, new "smart" reports provide a dynamic combination of report tables and pie charts, greatly enhancing the visual aspect of the console.             

There will be a new VMware vCenter Server Plug-in that will provide VMware datacenters to enhance their automated datacenter operations with integration to the PerfectDisk console for better central management. And enhanced virtualization reports that show fragmentation issues across a virtual environment.

And finally, new integration with Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 allows the console to seamlessly integrate with Micrsoft SCOM 2007.

More control. Better control. More flexibility. More virtualization awareness. New console.

It's a Perfect 10. Coming soon.

                       

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PerfectDisk 2008 Command Center Service Pack 1 (Build 60)

PerfectDisk 2008 Command Center Service Pack 1 (Build 60) is now available. Several bugs have been fixed, and the following enhancements have been made:

• Detection of a remote desktop session and ability to set deployment credentials if the Command Center is running under Remote Desktop Connection.
• Added a volume name to email Alert and Warning notifications.
• Added the ability to set a time period when synchronization with PerfectDisk clients will not run. 
• Diagnostics on a local computer now checks the Windows Event Log for Command Center errors.
• Added a button to view local event log to action list on Queue pane and Task Details dialog.
• For the migration of PerfectDisk 8 Command Center database, added a status message of what is currently being migrated.
• Deployment -- A warning message is now shown if the location of installation files is on a mapped network drive.
• Deployment -- the Command Center now does not allow deployment of earlier than Build 52 of PerfectDisk clients.

Existing Command Center users can manually check for updates to update to the latest build.

                    

New today -- PerfectDisk 2008 Command Center, PerfectDisk 2008 for VMware ESX Bundle, PerfectDisk 2008 in German and French

We're excited to be making several major announcements today:

• The PerfectDisk 2008 Command Center is now available for sites requiring a centralized management console. It includes a much-improved user interface, new reports, enhanced reports, improved performance, new deployment options, new installation options, and more. One thing has not changed - it is still offered for free, as we believe centralized management is something businesses should expect in the most robust enterprise defragmentation solution.

          

• PerfectDisk 2008 for VMware ESX Bundle, a turnkey solution that provides a simple yet robust performance optimization solution for sites running VMware ESX Server.

• German and French versions of PerfectDisk 2008 are now available. Click on FR (French) or DE (Germany) in the upper-right hand corner of the Raxco Software website to obtain information and the products in the respective languages.

              

Still more is coming in 2008 - stay tuned.

PerfectDisk Pro User Community is Launched

Last week's buzz was all about PerfectDisk Rx Suite, a new offering with simplicity and a set of features for the many users who were looking for just that. This week, it's the power user's turn.

Today we are launching the PerfectDisk Pro User Community. We know many of you have suggestions, ideas, complaints, kudos and more to share with each other and to Raxco. We receive some of them now, we see them on various user groups and forums, and we participate when we can. But we wanted to make sure there is a common place to go if you want to talk to other PerfectDisk users, share experiences, make requests - whatever you want. This community network is for you. By joining this network of PerfectDisk users, you'll be part of a special club - one that can share their voice, and ensure their voice will be heard by Raxco Software, including senior management.

PerfectDisk 9 is in the works for release later this year. It will bring you many enhancements and improvements to PerfectDisk 8. As mentioned in this space before, if you take a look at PerfectDisk Rx Suite and think it's a nice compliment to V8, which many of you have, then go for it. If you decide it's not for you - no worries, the professional product marches on.

Click here for an invitation to the PerfectDisk User Community.

I look forward to seeing you in the forum!

Command Center -- Remote Access

Many of our customers running in an enterprise have found PerfectDisk 8's Remote Desktop Connection feature of PerfectDisk to be a very handy administrative tool. I wanted to give you a brief overview for those of you not familiar with this capability.

The Remote Desktop Connection feature of PerfectDisk Command Center allows you to easily connect to another computer. All you need is network access and permissions to connect to the other computer. With Remote Desktop, you can have access to a Windows session that is running on your computer when you are at another computer. To use Remote Desktop, you need the following:

• A computer running Windows XP Professional or 2003 ("remote" computer) with a connection to a Local Area Network or the Internet
• A second computer with access to the Local Area Network via network connection, modem, or Virtual Private Network (VPN) connection

• Appropriate user accounts and permissions.

For more detailed information, you can view the help file in the Command Center section under the topic "Connecting to a Remote Desktop."