vSphere 5 Support

[JasonJoel]

Probably a bit premature to ask this, but someone was going to ask sooner or later so it might as well be me.

Do you guys know when you will be ready to comment on vSphere 5 compatibility (both with VMFS 3 and the new VMFS 5 datastores)?

Jason

[Gostev]

Hi Jason, current release (5.0.2 that was shipped in April) already includes support for ESXi 5 RC that we have available. Thanks.

[UPDATE] 08 Sep 2011
Here is the shortcut to post with vSphere 5 RTM support statement with version 5.0.2.230

[UPDATE] 20 Oct 2011
The patch adding full vSphere 5 support (including VMFS5 support) is now available through our technical support. You must be running Veeam Backup & Replication version 5.0.2.230 (latest product version released on April 11th, 2011). Please be sure to double check your product version in Help > About before applying the patch. If you are running the earlier product version, you must upgrade the product first.

[Bunce]

Must admit - I wasn't overly happy about Veeam delving into HyperV as feared it would lessen the chances of features being fixed/added to the VMWare product due to re-allocation of coding resources..

BUT, given the licensiing change in vSphere 5, we'll be seriously considering switching to HyperV which is something I thought we'd never consider doing.. So bring it on!!

[ctchang]

Must admit - I wasn't overly happy about Veeam delving into HyperV as feared it would lessen the chances of features being fixed/added to the VMWare product due to re-allocation of coding resources..

BUT, given the licensiing change in vSphere 5, we'll be seriously considering switching to HyperV which is something I thought we'd never consider doing.. So bring it on!!

After reviewing all the latest features, I would say it should be called vSphere 4.5 instead of vSphere 5.0 as there isn’t much improvements feature wise over the previous 4.1 version.

To my great surprise, VMware launched it’s latest flagship product vSphere in such a hurry, it was originally planed to be released in Q3, 2011 or later. Why is this?

As people say “the devil always lies in the details”, after half reading the latest pricing guide, I quickly figured out the answer to the above question.

It’s all about $$$, VMware tells you the latest vSphere 5.0 doesn’t have any more restriction in CPU/RAM on an ESX host, that sounds so fabulous isn’t it? Or IS IT?

Let’s make a simple example:

Say you have the simplest cluster with two ESX hosts with 2 CPU and 128GB RAM each, you Enterprise Plus edition for these two is USD13,980.

With the previous vSphere 4.1, you have UNLMITED vRAM entitlement and up to 48 cores.

With the brand new vSphere 5.0 pricing model, for the same amount of license (ie, USD13,980), you can only have 192GB entitled vRAM, so in order to have the original 256GB vRAM entitlement, you need to pay extra 2 more Enterprise Plus license, which is USD6,990.

The more RAM your server has, the more you are going to pay with the new licensing model.

So my conclusion is VMware is discouraging people going into cloud in reality. Think about this, why would you buy a Dell Poweredge R710 (2 sockets) with only 96GB RAM installed? The maximum RAM Powerdge R710 is capable of 288GB RAM but you need to pay EXTRA (288GB-96GB) / 48GB = 4 more Enterprise Plus license.

In reality, CPU is always the last resource to run out, but RAM IS! Future server will have much more powerful CPU for sure, but RAM is still the number 1 factor deciding your cloud capacity, IOPS is the 2nd, Network is the 3rd and just to remind you once more, CPU is the last!

Very clever VMware, but will potential customer buy this concept is another story.

Hum…may be it’s a strong sign that I can finally sell my VMW after all these years.

* Please note the above is my own personal interpretation as a user, it doesn’t represent my current employer or related affiliates.

[Bunce]

I actually think the feature set is quite good - particularly storage and network related, and the appliance for VC (which I wish Veeam would do ) )

The interesting part is how Veeam's new replication featureset will compare/integrate with SRM's new inbuilt replication. Replication was the only reason we moved to Veeam in the first place, so Veeam's featureset will be a determining factor on whether we opt for an alternative.

But in terms of licensing, we're worse off as well. Our hosts are all dual core, 128GB, averaging 50-60GB allocated RAM per CPU. Currently requires 2 Enterprise licenses per host.

So to cover that we'll basically need 4 ent licenses (4x32) to cover off per host (or 3 ent plus I guess) - its just not gonna happen. The first question the boss is gonna ask is how much is HyperV and what can't it do? The answer will be 'alot' cheaper, and its maybe missing what 10% of vSphere features - won't take long for MS to reach feature parity..

Some of the doco provided by VMWare trying to explain the change is quite poor - quoting an avergae 5:1 consolidationr ratio when they've used figures such as 12:1 in most advertising, training material etc

The VAR's / Resellers are all copping a hammering from clients, and are now answering the phone with "Are you ringing about the new licensing? Yeah, we're pissed off to - as its going to cost us money with clients moving to alternative solutions).

Going by the uproar I've seen posted around, I wouldn't be surpises if by RTM time, the figures are tweaked a touch to dull the roar...

[Gostev]

Must admit - I wasn't overly happy about Veeam delving into HyperV as feared it would lessen the chances of features being fixed/added to the VMWare product due to re-allocation of coding resources...

No worries, we have nearly doubled the development team, so this is not the case.

Nevertheless, this is a very interesting discussion. I definitely cannot say I disagree with all points above, in fact I have predicted exactly this reaction to vSphere 5 release in SMB space almost 1/2 years ago, when I first got on vSphere 5 beta.

[dmanconi]

Hi

While this is a Veeam forum, I suggets people have a read of this article to get some additional clarity on the new vSphere 5 licensing...

http://lonesysadmin.net/2011/07/12/the- ... ing-grief/

On a different note, I really wish a runbook sytle interface (ala SRM runbook) was added to Veeam B & R to give VMware SRM a run for the money. The dual functionality of Veeam make it (personally) a better solution for a number of different scenarios.

Cheers
David

[Gostev]

If you are on Twitter, this new vSphere 5 licensing "feature" got #vTax hashtag... nice one, by the way
Follow the link for tweets with more interesting opinions, as well as some useful vRAM calculation script.

[digitlman]

This is a pure cash grab, thanks to the majority stakeholder EMC and their fleet of MBA-weilding Execs.

Now, if I have Veeam for Vmware, how much might it cost to move to Hyper-V support? Or to add Hyper-V in?

[Gostev]

Veeam v6 a single product that support both vSphere and Hyper-V in the same UI. We are planing to let our customers move licensed B&R vSphere sockets to Hyper-V sockets (and the other way around) at no charge.

[vMBasement]

And thats the real (v)Power of Veeam

[digitlman]

When can we expect v6? Before vsphere 5?

[Gostev]

In Q4 2011.

[ctchang]

When can we expect v6? Before vsphere 5?

I can answer this one.

Sure after as vSphere 5 is released already.

[digitlman]

Funny...i log in to vmware but can only dl v4 still......

[Gostev]

Funny...i log in to vmware but can only dl v4 still......

This is totally expected. Yesterday was merely an announcement of the upcoming release.

[JasonJoel]

The v5 licnsing from VMware actually doesn't impact me much, so I'm OK. All of our clusters are always 3 servers, and we try to maintain 50% memory load max to insure full vMotion capacity when we take a server out. Because I have those extra couple Enterprise CPU licenses from the 3rd server, I will have plenty vRAM capacity as well.

I can definitely see how people with very high memory servers (or heavily loaded servers) may be affected though!

Jason

[Gostev]

Anyone with low consolidation ratios will not be affected. But then again, isn't high consolidation ratio the main reason why we virtualize?
In any case, not everyone has "extra couple Enterprise CPU licenses" they are not using today and don't want to buy them just to upgrade.
I can definitely understand the frustration.

[ctchang]

Anyone with low consolidation ratios will not be affected. But then again, isn't high consolidation ratio the main reason why we virtualize?
In any case, not everyone has "extra couple Enterprise CPU licenses" they are not using today and don't want to buy them just to upgrade.
I can definitely understand the frustration.

Many ppl wish that vSphere 5 license was also just merely an announcement but will not put into real action. haha...

[vMBasement]

Aside from pricing, I do like the VMFS5 advantages.. no more 2-4-8MB blocks needed, everything 1MB, and still be able to size up to big files and 60Tb datastores...

[bruor]

We're one of the companies that will benefit from the licensing change. We've got 4CPU sockets of enterprise plus licensed running on 2 servers with 48GB of ram in each. We've only provisioned 78GB of ram because vcenter starts to complain when hosts get too close to their max capacity. The licensing change actually allows me to double my host count to 4 with the same amount of RAM per server without incurring additional charges.

I know the licensing scheme is going to bite into large enterprise more heavily but the SMB space will get a nice cost cut!

[mmonroe]

We have 3 hosts that each has 2 cpus and will hold 192meg of RAM. 6 enterprise plus v4 licenses would allow us to fully utilize all of the hardware on these three hosts. To fully utiltize these exact same three hosts with v5 will require us to double the licenses from 6 to 12.

Double the cost? No seriously, double the cost?

[vmbackupuser]

Apparently vSphere5 won't be publicly available for download until late Q3 2011
Hopefully Veeam won't follow the VMware 's per VM licensing change.
It does seem odd for VMware to penalise customers with high-consolidation ratio, or perhaps VMware just wants to cash-in on the action
Its also been said vRam limits are soft and won't prevent VMs from starting if they are exceeded.

One of my fave vSphere5 features is the ability to put a Datastore into Maintenance Mode where is will vacate all VMs from the datastore onto others.

[Bunce]

We're one of the companies that will benefit from the licensing change. We've got 4CPU sockets of enterprise plus licensed running on 2 servers with 48GB of ram in each. We've only provisioned 78GB of ram because vcenter starts to complain when hosts get too close to their max capacity. The licensing change actually allows me to double my host count to 4 with the same amount of RAM per server without incurring additional charges.

I know the licensing scheme is going to bite into large enterprise more heavily but the SMB space will get a nice cost cut!

SMB's are likely to be hit hardest. I'd day your configuration is quite rare:

Very few have purchased only 48GB of RAM in a server for the past 2 years for Virtualisation purposes - for the exact point as you've alluded to - that memory runs out first - so its wasted hardware given there's is almost always underutilised CPU. RAM is cheap and an additional server for SMB's can be costly, so they tend to pack them with RAM.

But - good news for you! You can say to your boss you had a 6th sense about the upcoming licensing change.

[JasonJoel]

Anyone with low consolidation ratios will not be affected. But then again, isn't high consolidation ratio the main reason why we virtualize?
In any case, not everyone has "extra couple Enterprise CPU licenses" they are not using today and don't want to buy them just to upgrade.
I can definitely understand the frustration.

High consolidation ratio is ONE of the reasons we virtualize. For my part of my company it is not the MAIN reason, though (our IT organization would have a different answer, possibly)

Main reasons for me:
1. Ease of maintance
2. Quick Deployment
3. High availabilty
4. Improved disaster recovery

All that being said, if I were on the bad end of these changes I would be seriously POed too!

Jason

[wuffers]

How do the new vRAM entitlements affect you?

Please take 2 minutes of your time to fill out this vSphere 5 migration survey:
http://wuffers.net/2011/07/18/vsphere-5 ... ion-survey

We need more data! Results will be posted in the main vSphere 5 licensing thread over at VMTN:
http://communities.vmware.com/thread/320877

First round of results here:
http://communities.vmware.com/message/1795012#1795012

[Bunce]

Rumour that VMWare may review the licensing: http://www.gabesvirtualworld.com/vmware ... k-on-vtax/

[Gostev]

Great news! I always throught that the licensing approach is quite fair, but actual entitlement values are not.

[Gostev]

http://virtualization.info/en/news/2011 ... icing.html
Almost no change for SMB customers I would say

[ctchang]

Better than nothing.