As a security meaure,  SSH access to the service console  using the Root account is disabled by default on vSPhere ESX 4.   Although not best practice,  there are times you may wish to enable access to the Root user.

Method – CLI commands show in bold

1. Login as Root to the ESX console
2. Go to the SSH directory  –  cd /etc/ssh
3. Open the ssh_config  file –  nano sshd_config
4. Change PermitRootLogin no  to PermitRootLogin yes
5. Save and exit the config file   – CTRL+ X , click Y to confirm
6. Restart the SSHD service  – service sshd restart
7. Amend the service console firewall rules -   esxcfg-firewall -e sshClient and esxcfg-firewall -e sshServer

The Root account should now be able to connect remotely using SSH

Please note, this applies to ESX only,  ESXi does not have a Service Console.   Access is provided using the remote command line interface or pearl toolkit.  SSH access can be configured to the  support mode, however it is enabled in a different manner.

When a virtual machine is renamed ,  the underlying datastore folder is unchanged.    This can cause confusion in various scenarios.

To overcome this quickly and easily,  simply migrate the virtual machine datastore using storage vmotion.  During the process the virtual machine files are renamed automatically.

To enter maintenance mode using the command line interface,

vimsh -n -e /hostsvc/maintenance_mode_enter

To exit maintenance mode use

vimsh -n -e /hostsvc/maintenance_mode_exit