Former IT company wont give us vCenter password

we have 3 vmware boxes. Apparently the former IT company that was managing this network was using a pc in the server room as the vCenter server. eveything is vsphere 3.5. they wont give us the password for the vcenter account b/c they said its a password they use on all clients and they dont want us to have it. can i install our updated vCenter 4.1 on my workstation and manage the cluster or would all the settings be lost?

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Turgon

tdean wrote: »

we have 3 vmware boxes. Apparently the former IT company that was managing this network was using a pc in the server room as the vCenter server. eveything is vsphere 3.5. they wont give us the password for the vcenter account b/c they said its a password they use on all clients and they dont want us to have it. can i install our updated vCenter 4.1 on my workstation and manage the cluster or would all the settings be lost?

Im not sure. I suggest you also ask this question on VMWare's forum before you risk making a difficult situation worse.

cyberguypr

Is the vCenter PC/server joined to a domain? If so, you should be able to log in with a domain admin account.

tdean

cyberguypr wrote: »

Is the vCenter PC/server joined to a domain? If so, you should be able to log in with a domain admin account.

it is not. just a standalone pc.

Stiltz79

Can you login as another account wth admin rights and change the password?

MentholMoose

Can you ask the former company to send someone to change the password? You can reset the the Windows administrator account password to get access to the server and vCenter:
Forgot the Administrator's Password? - Windows Password Recovery - Windows Password Reset

Don't install vCenter on your workstation, except as a temporary solution. It is a database-driven server application that controls the ESX machines, not simply a client.

tdean

thanks for the replies guys... i read that it was tied to the local admin acct, so i changed that and im in!!

when we upgrade, should i install this on a server or a stand alone pc like this?

kalebksp

Install it on a server, it's an important part of the infrastructure. Personally I like to virtualize my VC so that it can benefit from HA like the other VMs and I have one less physical server.

tdean

kalebksp wrote: »

Install it on a server, it's an important part of the infrastructure. Personally I like to virtualize my VC so that it can benefit from HA like the other VMs and I have one less physical server.

ok, i will make anote of this. i am just learning this stuff now. kinda got thrown into the fire. when we upgrade to 4.1 i will keep this in mind.

RTmarc

Just to throw an alternative preference into the mix, I prefer the vSphere server as either a separate physical server or a virtual server in a separate environment. You don't run into an annoying issues when you need to bring the entire environment down for yearly / major updates / modifications or disaster events when your virtual environment is down. Same goes for at least a single domain controller.