SAP Hardware certification for VMware ESX

A topic that comes up frequently is, which Servers are supported to run SAP software on VMware ESX in Production ?

To answer this question I have to differentiate between Microsoft Windows and Linux.

Windows:

Up until recently, to run SAP on VMware ESX on a given server, the server vendor had to do an additional certification specifically for VMware ESX. These certifications were published as SAP Benchmarks on http://www.sap.com/benchmark. In January, SAP agreed to remove this additional certification. This change was announced in the Benchmark Council in February. From now on, any server is supported that is

a.) on the VMware Hardware Compatibility List (http://www.vmware.com/resources/guides.html) AND !

b.) on the SAP certified hardware list, maintained at http://www.saponwin.com/

This decision shows that SAP trusts the stability of the VMware ESX platform and widens server choices for our joint customers.

Linux:

For Linux, the hardware vendors are responsible to decide which servers they would like to support for SAP running on VMware ESX. Below you will find a reference for each vendor. I reference the notes, since they are updated frequently. You can also find this information under: http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/linux -> Supported Platforms

FSC: <https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/linux?rid=/webcontent/uuid/930e18ae-0e01-0010-1a96-dcf4164503ff>

IBM SAP Note: 171380

HP SAP Note: 171371

Dell SAP Note: 300900

SUN SAP Note: 597470

Please keep in mind that server certification is only a factor for servers that run "productive" SAP instances. For test and development you can use any server that is on VMware's HCL at: http://www.vmware.com/resources/guides.html.