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14 Replies Last post: Sep 9, 2008 2:54 PM by Dave.Mishchenko
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ESXi Licensing...

Jul 29, 2008 5:03 PM

Click to view s1xth's profile Hot Shot s1xth 347 posts since
Jul 29, 2008

I have just started to use Vmware ESXi today and I have a question regarding the license for it. On the bottom of the license page it says: ", but is restricted to deployment on less than or equal to 2 CPUs.".....what do you mean by 2 CPU's? Does that mean I can use it on a dual quad core server and be able to use all eight cores?? Right now I have it installed and running on a single quad core system. When I applied my license serial number it said that I am licensed for 1 CPU.

I guess I am just confused, if anyone can explain further the licensing for ESXi I would appreciate it. I looked everywhere!

Thanks so much!

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Jul 29, 2008 5:14 PM
Click to view weinstein5's profile Guru weinstein5 5,672 posts since
Nov 19, 2005 VMware
Yes 2 CPU means 2 physical CPUs - so if you have a duel quad core cpu you will have 8 cores you can use - it indicates you are licensed for one CPU because that is all your using but you still have access yo all 4 cores - hope tha answers your question -
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Jul 29, 2008 5:19 PM
in response to: weinstein5
Click to view s1xth's profile Hot Shot s1xth 347 posts since
Jul 29, 2008

Exactly the answer to my question, I just was unsure of VMware's definition of 'CPU's', plus when I applied the license I was unsure of why it said Licensed for 1 CPU, but it does make sense, since I only have one SINGLE quad CPU, and I was assuming that it meant TWO PHYSICAL CPU's with 4 cores each.

Thanks for your help!!

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 1:03 AM
in response to: weinstein5
Click to view _Jester_'s profile Novice _Jester_ 5 posts since
Sep 9, 2008

Thats weird 'cause i'm using a dual-core but i still am getting 'Processor sockets: 1' and 'Processor cores per socket: 1'.... that is on the ESXi-free version (=Dell PowerEdge 850 with an Intel Dualcore 3Ghz and VMware Infrastructure Client). ?!

regards,
jester.
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 1:07 AM
in response to: _Jester_
Click to view Dave.Mishchenko's profile Guru Dave.Mishchenko 8,436 posts since
Nov 15, 2005 Moderator
Do you have ESXi licensed or still in demo mode? What specific model of CPU do you have?
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 3:40 AM
in response to: Dave.Mishchenko
Click to view _Jester_'s profile Novice _Jester_ 5 posts since
Sep 9, 2008

I've inserted some screenprints below with the relevant information from the configuration tab in VM Infrastr. Client. If you need more info please tell me.


vm_licence.jpg
vm_cpu.jpg

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 4:57 AM
in response to: _Jester_
Click to view VMKiwi's profile Lurker VMKiwi 4 posts since
Sep 9, 2008
Looks to me like you have only one CPU - why do you think you have 2? That Pentium-D is a hyperthreading processor, not multicore and definately not capable of supporting dual CPU's on a motherboard
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 6:41 AM
in response to: VMKiwi
Click to view _Jester_'s profile Novice _Jester_ 5 posts since
Sep 9, 2008

I've been in contact with Dell technical support and it has two cores but apparently no virtualisation support and thus will show up as one cpu (according to them). Weird thing is though when using vmware server on this machine i am sure i had assigned the cores to different virtual machines.....

Anyhow, thanx for the answers !!
jester.

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 9:20 AM
in response to: VMKiwi
Click to view _Jester_'s profile Novice _Jester_ 5 posts since
Sep 9, 2008
I think it is still odd.... i temporarily installed CentOS linux and here is the output of dmesg about the number of cpu's (and at the end it says: 2 cpu's) :

Initializing CPU#0
CPU 0 irqstacks, hard=c03f6000 soft=c03d6000
PID hash table entries: 4096 (order: 12, 65536 bytes)
Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
Memory: 1032580k/1048320k available (1893k kernel code, 15076k reserved, 767k data, 192k init, 130816k highmem)
Using HPET for base-timer
Using HPET for gettimeofday
Detected 3000.500 MHz processor.
Using hpet for high-res timesource
Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 6004.69 BogoMIPS (lpj=3002347)
Security Scaffold v1.0.0 initialized
SELinux: Initializing.
SELinux: Starting in permissive mode
There is already a security framework initialized, register_security failed.
selinux_register_security: Registering secondary module capability
Capability LSM initialized as secondary
Mount-cache hash table entries: 512 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000000
CPU: After vendor identify, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000000
monitor/mwait feature present.
using mwait in idle threads.
CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 16K
CPU: L2 cache: 1024K
CPU0: Physical Processor ID: 0
CPU0: Processor Core ID: 0
CPU0: Initial APIC ID: 0
CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000180
Intel machine check architecture supported.
Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#0.
CPU0: Intel P4/Xeon Extended MCE MSRs (24) available
CPU0: Thermal monitoring enabled
Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
CPU0: Intel(R) Pentium(R) D CPU 3.00GHz stepping 07
per-CPU timeslice cutoff: 2925.11 usecs.
task migration cache decay timeout: 2 msecs.
Booting processor 1/1 eip 3000
CPU 1 irqstacks, hard=c03f7000 soft=c03d7000
Initializing CPU#1
Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 6000.27 BogoMIPS (lpj=3000135)
CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000000
CPU: After vendor identify, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000000
monitor/mwait feature present.
CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 16K
CPU: L2 cache: 1024K
CPU1: Physical Processor ID: 0
CPU1: Processor Core ID: 1
CPU1: Initial APIC ID: 1
CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 20100000 00000000 00000180
Intel machine check architecture supported.
Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#1.
CPU1: Intel P4/Xeon Extended MCE MSRs (24) available
CPU1: Thermal monitoring enabled
CPU1: Intel(R) Pentium(R) D CPU 3.00GHz stepping 07
Total of 2 processors activated (12004.96 BogoMIPS).
ENABLING IO-APIC IRQs
..TIMER: vector=0x31 pin1=2 pin2=-1
checking TSC synchronization across 2 CPUs: passed.
Brought up 2 CPU

I'm to unfamiliar with VMware to understand how it sees the number of cpu's but i'm reading two cpu's here ?!
Thanx!
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 9:46 AM
in response to: _Jester_
Click to view christianZ's profile Virtuoso christianZ 2,212 posts since
Apr 21, 2006
As I remember someone having it here and there was needed bios updates (although I think it is not supported/Pentium D).
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 1:35 PM
in response to: VMKiwi
Click to view DOK's profile Lurker DOK 1 posts since
Nov 17, 2004

Hi,

VMKiwi wrote:Looks to me like you have only one CPU - why do you think you have 2? That Pentium-D is a hyperthreading processor, not multicore and definately not capable of supporting dual CPU's on a motherboard

I think that's not quite correct. A Pentium D certainly is a Dual Core CPU (basically two Pentium 4 cores nailed onto one die).

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Pentium_D>


Never tried ESX on one though.

Regards

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 2:31 PM
in response to: DOK
Click to view dwchan's profile Expert dwchan 570 posts since
Mar 25, 2006

what if you have are using a 4 socket quad core? i know the core doesn't matter, but what if you are using a 4 socket server (i.e. DL585) Does that mean esxi is not longer free? if there is a charge, would i be charge for 4 CPU license or 2 ?

dwc

Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 2:46 PM
in response to: _Jester_
Click to view Dave.Mishchenko's profile Guru Dave.Mishchenko 8,436 posts since
Nov 15, 2005 Moderator
This answer from Dell seems a bit bogus. You host should report one physical slot, 2 CPU cores and 2 logical CPUs. As chritianZ mentions, try a BIOS upgrade if available. I also recall a thread this week in which that was the solution.
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 2:52 PM
in response to: christianZ
Click to view _Jester_'s profile Novice _Jester_ 5 posts since
Sep 9, 2008
I'm almost certain i'm using the latest BIOS, but will check that just to be sure.
Reply Re: ESXi Licensing... Sep 9, 2008 2:54 PM
in response to: dwchan
Click to view Dave.Mishchenko's profile Guru Dave.Mishchenko 8,436 posts since
Nov 15, 2005 Moderator
When you run ESXi in standalone (free) mode, then you can run as many CPU cores as ESXi / ESX can support (i.e. up to 32 cores / 32 logical processors).
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