So 2 motherboards later I finally have a working Esx host, or at least the hardware for one, sort of.
Turns out the NIC the M5A97 R2.0 has onboard is not supported with ESXi which kind of sucks since I wanted to finish the build on the weekend but will now have to wait for the amazon delivery with the NIC instead.

I have returned the MSI board as it turned out to be busted. I picked up the M5A97, which is cheaper and actually posts, the only downside is that its extremely ugly. Light blue on brown, really ASUS?

I will keep this post short as there has not been much else going on. I will probably post my script for the samba setup this week, so there will be more content on this page soon.

M0nkey out.

Esxbox Update

Quick update on my upcoming ESX host project. I have decided to return the motherboard due to me getting an awesome deal on Ebay for the FX 8370. Sadly the board is designed for 95w CPU's, and due to the 125w power hog that is the 8-core FX 8370, this would not be a good pairing.

The replacement board is an MSI 970A Carbon. I decided to get something with an M.2 Drive to run vSphere off of, so this board should do quite nicely.

The CPU will arive next week, and the ram the week after. I am really excited to get this build finished, hopefully everything will go without any hiccups!

M0nkey out.

Tutorial: Creating an NFS Share on Centos 7

This tutorial will cover setting up a shared file directory on CentOS 7 using NFS. The guide will be sharing the directory with a Windows 10 Client.


1. Install the software
yum install nfs-utils libnfsidmap

2. Set the services to start on startup
systemctl enable nfs-server
systemctl enable rpcbind

3. Reboot the server
reboot

4. Select the directory you want to share or create one.
mkdir /nfsdir

5. Set permissions on the NFS shared directory
chmod 777 /nfsdir 

6. Edit the /etc/exports file with the location of your shared NFS directory.
Make sure the IP address is that of the PC you are sharing the directory with.
/nfsdir 192.168.1.3(rw,sync,no_root_squash,no_all_squash)

7. Export the directory
exportfs -r

8. Configure firewall
firewall-cmd --permanent --zone public --add-service mountd

firewall-cmd --permanent --zone public --add-service rpc-bind

firewall-cmd --permanent --zone public --add-service nfs

firewall-cmd --reload

9. Edit /etc/rc.local and add the following lines

systemctl restart nfs-server

mount -a

10. Add Services for NFS to Windows 10.

Search for Turn Windows features on or off in the start menu. 

11. Expand Services for NFS and check off Administrative Tools and Client for NFS

12. After the install reboot your computer

13. Mount the linux share to a network drive. Run the command, where 192.168.1.2 is the address of the Linux server. 

mount 192.168.1.2:\nfsdir z:

Enjoy your new Linux file server!




M0nkey out

Tutorial: Create a WIFI Access Point using Hostapd and a Raspberry Pi

This tutorial will guide you through the steps of converting your Raspberry Pi into a local WiFi Access Point for your network.
Security: WPA2

Note: The AP is for an existing network with working dhcp.

Recommended WiFi dongle: 
EDUP EP-MS1559 11N 300Mbps Wifi Wireless-N USB Adapter.

Is there a specific reason why I am recommending this one? No, not really but it has worked for me without any issues and it provides a strong signal without any drops. 

Also the antenna I am using came from a different dongle, however the one it comes with should do the job just fine. 

If you are going to get a different dongle make sure that it uses the Realtek 8192cu chip, it is possible to get an AP working on a different chipset however this guide is for 8192cu. 


Connect your Pi to your home network via ethernet and plugin the wifi dongle into one of the USB slots.

1.
dmseg | grep 8192cu
usbcore: registered new interface driver rtl8192cu

2.
sudo apt-get install hostapd bridge-utils

3.

wget http://www.daveconroy.com/wp3/wpcontent/uploads/2013/07/hostapd.zip
unzip hostapd.zip 
sudo mv /usr/sbin/hostapd /usr/sbin/hostapd.bak
sudo mv hostapd /usr/sbin/hostapd.edimax 
sudo ln -sf /usr/sbin/hostapd.edimax /usr/sbin/hostapd 
sudo chown root.root /usr/sbin/hostapd 
sudo chmod 755 /usr/sbin/hostapd

The hostapd binary by default does not work with the 8192 chipset however if you replace it with the one above it should work without any issues.

4.

nano /etc/network/interfaces
Edit the file to look like this, modify the IP values to fit your own network.
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 192.168.1.18
netmask 255.255.255.0
gateway 192.168.1.1

allow-hotplug wlan0
iface wlan0 inet manual

auto br0
iface br0 inet static
address 192.168.1.252
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.1.0
broadcast 192.168.1.255
gateway 192.168.1.1

bridge-ports eth0 wlan0

5. 

nano /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf

Edit the file to look like this, modify the fields to your requirements.

Generate the wpa-psk string by going to http://jorisvr.nl/wpapsk.html and entering your SSID and password into the generator.

ctrl_interface=/var/run/hostapd

macaddr_acl=0 auth_algs=1

driver=rtl871xdrv

interface=wlan0

bridge=br0

hw_mode=g

ieee80211n=1

wme_enabled=1

channel=4

ssid=Wifi-Name

macaddr_acl=0

auth_algs=1

ignore_broadcast_ssid=0

wpa=2

wpa_psk=4bba27cede6b7ee0a62c8d597dc8fb0b3ff4eebb99a5cd037e5acf4cb4a8

wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK

#wpa_pairwise=TKIP

rsn_pairwise=CCMP

6. 

nano /etc/default/hostapd

Uncomment the line: DAEMON_CONF="/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf"

This will enable hostapd to start on boot.

7. 

Restart your pi and attempt to connect!

Enjoy your new AP.

M0nkey out.

Tutorial: Install Nvidia GPU Drivers on Centos 7

Installing GPU drivers on Linux has always been quite the headache.
This method uses nvidia-detect which simplifies the process.

Run the following commands:

1. 
rpm --import https://www.elrepo.org/RPM-GPG-KEY-elrepo.org
Imports the elrepo public key.

2.
rpm -Uvh http://www.elrepo.org/elrepo-release-7.0-2.el7.elrepo.noarch.rpm
Installs the elrepo rpm

3.
yum install nvidia-detect
Installs nvidia detect

4.
nvidia-detect -v
Lists the required drivers

5.
yum install $(nvidia-detect)
Installs the required drivers


Reboot your system after the drivers are installed and you will be able to access the nvidia control panel in your list of installed applications.

I hope this method will help you as as much as it helped me.

M0nkey out.

Projekt: ESXBox

Alright lets get started!

Putting this thing together is going to take some time so in-between updates on the ESXBox i will be posting other material, relative to virtualization and sometimes on other topics completely. 

So the main goal was to create a VM Host on the cheap, throw ESXi 6.5 on it and start exploring. 

Luckily I already have a case (Corsair Air 540) and a power-supply (Corsair CX 750W) so what is left is a CPU, RAM and a Motherboard. 
The Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3 board arrived yesterday and the rest will arrive over the next few weeks.

I am torn between the AMD FX 8350 and the AMD FX 6300 and will have to make a decision next week on whether the extra 2 cores are worth 50 dollars. 

The board will support a maximum of 32GB of DDR3 memory and because of this build being purely experimental with no heavy technical requirements, the cheapest batch from amazon should do just fine. 

I think I will keep this entry fairly short as a basic outline for the project. Any follow up on the VM Host will come once more parts arrive. 

The next journal entry will be a guide on creating a Raspberry Pi AP, and If i have time I may organize the entire thing into an easily executable bash script for the convenience of others.

Until then!

M0nkey out. 

Hello World.

Overdue post. 

So the idea of putting  a blog together came out of curiosity as well as necessity. 

Keeping a folder full of tutorials on Linux and god knows what was becoming daunting, so sharing this collection felt like a good thing to do.

Plus organizing all of my material on the web can be very useful for future reference. 

This journal will contain posts on but will not be limited to:

• Anything PC Related
• Linux
• Bash
• Powershell
• Virtualization
• CSS/HTML

The first project this blog will see is the construction of an ESXI host. I will be putting updates over the next few weeks as the parts come in. Expect pictures!

The first part got in today, and its the Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3 motherboard. 

The next entry will explain the rest of the project. 

That should do it for introductions.

Until later!

M0nkey out.