VMTN

I just went and paid the $200 USD, should be interesting to see how it goes!

TinkerTry.com/evalexperience

Can't see any contact details on the VMUG Advantage website to ask this:

OK - so far so good.  vCenter downloaded and running fine in Workstation. 

We're going to be getting the vCloud Suite this year so I need a copy to play with and understand it.  So I add it to the basket, go to download and...

Nope.  Not what I was expecting.

http://www.vmware.com/products/vcloud-suite/

It's vCloud suite as it was, not as it is now.  vCD is no longer included; vShield and vCNS are incorporated into other products;  I believe, and you now get vSphere, SRM, vRealize Ops and vRealize Automation.  Since this is what we will be getting, and since this is what is on VMware's website this is what I expected to be downloading.  vCD is absolutely no use to me if it's not part of the current offering and this is in part why I registered for the VMUG Advantage in the first place, parting with $200 of my own money. 

If this is now updated on the VMUG Advantage website - I still can't then download it as I've already registered to download vCloud Suite.  Somewhat frustrating.

So where do I go fro here?  Will we get new additions/updates after Feb 3rd?

Hi 3CV, I have some status updates for you:

• the expected email entitled "About your VMUG Advantage EVALExperience Software benefits" from noreply@kivuto.com arrived Fri Jan 16 6:12pm eastern (that was about 16 hours after I made my $200 payment earlier Jan 16).  I hadn't spotted that email until today. I've now clicked the unique URL to complete my registration, and was immediately given access to the downloads.
• the contact for questions about EVALExperience is at advantage@vmug.com but a helpful person there named Greg is already looking into these good questions you posed here in this thread, and similar questions in the dialogue below my related article.

Hey, that's great!  Thanks. It's a fantastic resource but they need to keep in step with what's on the web site, although I'd like older software to be available - lost of people still on vSphere 5.1.

3CV wrote:

 

Hey, that's great!  Thanks. It's a fantastic resource but they need to keep in step with what's on the web site, although I'd like older software to be available - lost of people still on vSphere 5.1.

I am not sure that will happen, the intend of this program is to allow people playing with the latest and greatest... so they can explore what is coming, they can test it, get in to the trenches.

Yeah, I know.  But I can wish... .  However that's exactly what I was hoping to do with the vCloud suite, but it's not the latest suite.  TBH, it's the one we'd have liked before VMware decided to pull it.  vCD would give us everything we need but it's moving to the vRealize suite with different or reduced functionality.  Still, if I can get a copy of vRealize...

So I ended up biting the bullet and getting the EvalExperience through VMUG Advantage.

The only real big problem I saw was I got 8x 2CPU VSAN Licenses, but only 1x 2CPU vCloud Suite Standard License. This isn't fun on my levels as I can only use 1 host at home becuase I dont have enough licenses for my ESXi hosts. I know that I can run the hosts off of 60-day evaluation periods, but it kind of defeats the purpose, especially when I am building to work on long term logging initiative testing.

Thank you Mike, eagerly anticipating what happens next, now that vSphere 6 was announced.

Mike, I recent visitor left a comment that looks promising:

TinkerTry.com/evalexperience/#comment-1834732993

MoonDogg Joey DiJulio • 4 days ago

"Thanks for reaching out.

If you download 5.5 and are looking to upgrade, EVALExperience will be

get updated with vSphere 6 a couple of weeks after the release so you won’t
have to worry about waiting an entire year to get a copy of 6.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Greg"

VMware EVALExperience vSphere 6.0 license keys are here:

vmugadvantage.onthehub.com

I produced a short video of the 2 step procedure to actually apply the license key. It's added to the end of my existing article about EVALExperience:

TinkerTry.com/evalexperience

Research into where one gets the ESXi 6.0 license key(s) from is still underway...