Paid for versus free VMware 6.5 / 6.7 / 7.0

[nunhead_man]

We have used free ESXi for years and are now at version 6.5. We have a paid for version of Workstation which we sometimes use for managing our virtual machines alongside the web interface.

The two boxes that we use are in fine condition and we note that we cannot move up to free v6.7 as the processes are excluded in that update.

https://communities.vmware.com/thread/595097

We note also that the updates in 6.7 are largely about vSphere although there are obviously some improvements in the underlying infrastructure

In particular one of our bugbears is managing iSCSI and this seems to have been improved in version 6.7.

So my question is if we buy a paid for version of vSphere - say VMware vSphere Essentials Kit - does this do away with the hardware limitation?

[IRIX201110141]

Looks to me like 6.0 U3 was the last version to support the PowerEdge 610

Correct and VMware ends the general support for 6.0 last month.

Regards,
Joerg

[nunhead_man]

Good morning,

Thank you all for your help.

I have now worked out how to use the "what works with which version of the ESXi" tool.

It seems as though hardware restrictions roll forward through the years so that a specification was allowed to run version 6.5 say five years ago will no longer run it if it is installed today.  is this correct?

For example, we have a Dell with4 CPUs x Intel Xeon CPU E3-1220 V2 @ 3.10GH running ESXi 6.5 - this particular processor seems to return no results in the search tool when I enter "Dell", "tower server ", and the Xeon model - am I doing something wrong?

[IRIX201110141]

Choose "Systems/Servers" and enter your Model Number like T610.  VMware Compatibility Guide - System Search

As you see they where certified with Nehalem and Westmare up  for 6.0 in a supported manner and 6.5 in an unsupportet way. Because the fact that older drivers are shipped and most of the parts a based on common chips.

About your entry level E3 CPU it can be run up 7.0. Check VMware Compatibility Guide - cpu

But a server is based on more and not only CPU. So check the modell or storage and network HBA as well.

Again... install 6.5 and run it.

Regards,
Joerg