Cluster config without Ft-ha and Vmotion licenses

[Giampos17970]

Hi, I have a VSphere essential bundle (not plus) without Vmotion and FT licenses (as you know), but it's possible to config hosts in cluster configuration.

What feautures can I have with this? Or is completely useless set this option with basic license??

[vmroyale]

Hello.

With Essentials you get Thin Provisioning, Update Manager and vStorage APIs for Data Protection. You can verify this in the Edition Comparison chart.

Good Luck!

[Giampos17970]

off course, I know. But my question is another, I would know if I can use the "cluster" config in any way.

I see that in my "datacenter" I can add "new host" and "new cluster" too, but why? If in my license there's no HA/FT license ?

[KrishK]

Cluster means Service availability. HA is a feature of VMware cluster without which you can't commit 99% availability of a VM.

[Giampos17970]

Thanks to all, but this isn't what I want to know.

I know well what's HA/FT and live VMotion, and I know too that theese feautures aren't presents in Essentials bundle,

My question is, Why with this license I can setup a cluster config? Why this feauture isn't locked? And what happens if i configure a cluster with VSphere essentials?

[Exwork]

In your case, you'd be using a cluster as more of a container for organizational purposes. You can run a cluster without HA or DRS, or even with a single host. Putting multiple hosts in a cluster, in this case, would just let you organize a little better.

[Giampos17970]

That sounds good!

what mean: " Putting multiple hosts in a cluster, in this case, would just let you organize a little better"

what advantages can I have ? Can I do a "manual" FT ?? In case one host fail I can run VM's on the other without moving ? (shared storage)

[Exwork]

There's not any major advantages that I'm aware of, other than being able to organize them into a container. You might be able to turn on EVC on a cluster, but I don't know if your licensing would allow that.

As far as FT - you won't get this. FT is a step above HA, and basically means a mirrored copy of your guest is running on another host. If the first host fails, the mirrored copy would take over, with no downtime to your guest.

At best, you could get a "poor mans" HA. If your host failed, you'd have to register your VMs manually onto another host. You could do this with shared storage, but the VM would have to be off to do it.

[Giampos17970]

you wrote:

"At best, you could get a "poor mans" HA. If your host failed, you'd have

to register your VMs manually onto another host. You could do this with

shared storage, but the VM would have to be off to do it."

This is wat I want, but I understand I can do this both in separated host and in cluster config, the only "must" is to have a shared storage.

so, no advantages to put hosts in cluster if we haven't HA license !

That's right?

[AndreTheGiant]

Cluster freature are HA, FT, DRS, EVC...

Note that vMotion can work also across clusters.

In your case you have only the essential version, so none of those features.

So you have not benefit of create a cluster (you can still migrate a powered-off VM across hosts).

Andre