VMware versions. Whats what.

[andyrite]

Open up a webpage and go to the ip address of the vmware Esxi server. It should display a webpage which can download VMware Infrastructure Client from.

[Theblacksheep]

All 8 & all 16Gb of ram?

The VMWare Server (free), has a web interface for administration and used a Java based console screen.
Does ESXi have anything like that? As i cant see nout...?

All 16GB of ram and 8 cores, yes it'll support 4 p(hysical) cpus with 4 cores each.

p/cpu and core count goes up with the release if ESX 4 later this year.

ESXi (free) will need a PC with the Vi client to manage it (www to ip of ESXi). Virtual center (the management of paid-for Vi3 servers) has a web client you can use for accessing your VMs though without the need for the ViClient.... if you are upgrading from ESXi-free to ESX/ESXi-Vi3 in the future.

Speed is still the main advantage over having a copy of windows server underneath. Its just a bonus that you dont have a windows server patch every week and restart each week, nor java updates.

[somabc]

Open up a webpage and go to the ip address of the vmware Esxi server. It should display a webpage which can download VMware Infrastructure Client from.

Yes but not so great if you use OSX or Linux

I think VMware should rebrand their line to make it simpler

eg.

VMware Starter (Player)
VMWare Home Premium (Workstation)
VMWare Business (Server)
VMware Enterprise (ESXi)
and so on!

etc.

[boomam]

Open up a webpage and go to the ip address of the vmware Esxi server. It should display a webpage which can download VMware Infrastructure Client from.

I know i can do that.
But what about accessing that sort of stuff without the client like the VMWare server can do...?

All 8 cores, yes it'll support 4 p(hysical) cpus.

So the limit is on the processors not the cores? Similar to how windows is licenced as sockets rarther than cores.
So a dual processor system consisting of two Xeon Quad cores would work completely? With hardware virtualization support.

& how come the GUI says the maximum file size is 256Gb...? Bit small aint it?

ESXi (free) will need a PC with the Vi client to manage it (www to ip of ESXi). Virtual center (the management of paid-for Vi3 servers) has a web client you can use for accessing your VMs though without the need for the ViClient.... if you are upgrading them in the future.

So basically to get the free web admin thing that comes in VMWare Server i have to buy VC Client? lol.

Speed is still the main advantage over having a copy of windows server underneath. Its just a bonus that you dont have a windows server patch every week and restart each week, nor java updates.

Is it that much faster though? With hardware virtualization support the difference cant be that big...?

[Theblacksheep]

Yes but not so great if you use OSX or Linux

ViC runs in wine though doesnt it?

They have released both their VDI client and virtual center as open source, hopefully more this year.

[andyrite]

To get a file bigger than 256gb you will need to recreate your VMFS filesystem with a larger block size.

[Theblacksheep]

So the limit is on the processors not the cores? Similar to how windows is licenced as sockets rarther than cores.

So a dual processor system consisting of two Xeon Quad cores would work completely? With hardware virtualization support.

& how come the GUI says the maximum file size is 256Gb...? Bit small aint it?

So basically to get the free web admin thing that comes in VMWare Server i have to buy VC Client? lol.

Is it that much faster though? With hardware virtualization support the difference cant be that big...?

Yeah, although there is still a limit on cores, I think this is 32 for the free version of ESXi.

2 X QC xeons will work.. I'm running that at home, plus a few test boxes here @ work like that. No problems.

Not sure on the file size, maybe thats down to your datastore file system. You can have 2TB VM disks (file sizes) if formated with 8mb blocks on a VMFS3 disk. Depends how you set this up in the first place.

If you want a web administration tool instead of the free ViClient for the free ESXi server, yes you'll need to buy VC.

Its more about resources than speed, sorry, my bad description. How much physical resources does windows 2008, java, tomcat and vmware server consume that could be better used for providing VMs?

[boomam]

To get a file bigger than 256gb you will need to recreate your VMFS filesystem with a larger block size.

So with the blade in question having just a few small HDDs, that wont be an issue, but lets say for example i tie it into our SAN with iSCSI, i just format the iSCSI volume with bigger block sizes to get around that 'issue' then?

Next question, have a new VM, how do i get the new VM to see its HDD? lol.
Ive set the VM to boot off an ISO of an XP install CD and it doesnt want to see the HDD.


And how again, in detail, do i import the VM files off my old VMware installation to the new ESXi one then?

Thanks in advance again everyone, the info is very much appriciated.

[Theblacksheep]

have a new VM, how do i get the new VM to see its HDD? lol.
Ive set the VM to boot off an ISO of an XP install CD and it doesnt want to see the HDD.

And how again, in detail, do i import the VM files off my old VMware installation to the new ESXi one then?

If you are booting the aging XP you may notice it booting with a SCSI controller for the HDs.... XP disk doesnt have this driver installed nativly, so you'll need to add this.... i'm not gonna type it all out, vmware forums has this problem multiple times, just do a search, its pretty simple.


Easiest way, long term is VMware converter 4... you can mess around with the VMs while you are doing it (I shrunk some C drives that where miles too big last week, v-useful) and its good practice because it has more uses than just converting p2v... example: its used for restoring VCB backups. Give it the IP address of the running VM you want to move, and tell it where you want to put it... and wait.

Why cant you just copy the images over? ESX/ESX vms are slightly different to workstation/server created VMs... something to do with the virtual hardware in old vms. workstation 6 level vms can be converted over with vmware converter.

i just format the iSCSI volume with bigger block sizes to get around that 'issue' then?

Yes... although remember this is the individual file (VM disk (VMDK)) size on a VMFS formatted lun (e.g: D:\ of a VM file server) The VMFS lun itself can still be large. With an 8mb block size small file types will consume 8mb instead of 1mb. Personally if you are getting over 200GB if possible I'd split the VMdisk up onto multiple disks/partitions (D, E, G) rather than having one 2tb VMDK and a larger block size.