Slow logon on XenApp servers

Many XenApp administrators experienced strange issue that logon process is unexpectedly slow when users log on to the XenApp servers.

This issue may occur if RSoP logging is enabled and there is a large WMI repository on the problem Windows client or Windows Server computer. The WMI repository is located on the following path: %windir%\System32\Wbem\Repository

The Windows WMI repository can become corrupted or increases in size on Windows servers being used with XenApp. WMI corruption can cause problems for monitoring systems, and potentially some applications. You can rebuild the repository, but that may lead to other issues, and it doesn’t fix the underlying problem.

The problem occurs on systems that have many people logging into them, and hence a large amount of GPO logging. This logging affects the WMI repository, causing it to grow considerably, and sometimes get corrupted.

The RSoP logging process to the WMI repository causes delays to console logons and especially Remote Desktop logons.
Larger WMI repository sizes in %windir%\system32\wbem\repository cause longer logon delays.

You may disable GPO logging by editing GPO that gets applied to this server.

Go to Computer -> Administrative -> System -> Group Policy. Enable the setting “Turn off Resultant Set of Policy Logging.” Apply that, and you should get no corruption in future.

Now you need to rebuild WMI repository, create .bat file -> edit the file with notepad and write the following:

@echo off
net stop winmgmt /y
Ren %windir%\system32\wbem\repository repository.old
Ren %windir%\system32\wbem\mof mof.old
net start winmgmt
cd /d %windir%\system32\wbem
for %%i in (*.dll) do RegSvr32 -s %%i
net start "SMS Agent Host"
net start "IP Helper"

Save the file and run it as administrator.
Note you can also check your repository state with “winmgmt /verifyrepository”. This won’t make any changes, but will tell you if there are any known issues.

Refrence: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2020286

How to configure DNS for Citrix XenServer

Unfortunately there is no direct method to manually configure your DNS servers in Citrix XenServer console.

You may have your DNS server automatically assigned via DHCP configuration received from a DHCP server, however in a real environment you won't have your XenServer host configured with dynamic IPs.

To configure your DNS servers do the following:

From Console, access your local command shell.

Now list your existing physical network interfaces, xe pif-list.

Reconfigure your target network interface with new IPv4 configurations, xe pif-reconfigure-ip uuid=youruuid mode=static IP=ipaddresshere netmask=subnetmask gateway=yourgateway DNS=dnsserver1,dnsserver2.

Now your DNS server(s) is successfully configured.

Note: for multiple DNS server configuration, use the same command line and add all name servers separated by comma ",".

How to install & configure XenCenter

XenCenter is the client GUI for XenServer, from which you can manage your hosts using numerous visualization features.

You can download XenCenter from here.

After your download is complete, run .exe file as administrator and follow the installation steps.

Now XenCenter is installed, let's open it to add our XenServer host(s).

Enter your host IP address and root password.

Now your host is connected.

To access host's console, go to console tab.

To access built-in user friendly management console, write xsconsole command and press Enter.

Now you are ready to fully control your host and build your virtual environment.

How to install XenServer 6.5

XenServer is a virtualization platform delivers you with features needed for server and datacenter implementation.

First may need to download the installation image, upgrade, fixes and GUI clients from here.

To manage your XenServer you may need one of the available GUI clients, XenCenter for Windows or XenOrchestra for non-Windows systems.

After your downloads are complete, prepare your installation media with the installation image and boot your server from it.

Before you installation, it's highly recommended to check installation guide for system requirements.

Now we walk through the installation:

Now installation is complete, server will report and should open like this: