ESX 4 Basic Questions

[doyletim]

I've inherited an ESX 4 setup.  4 Server 2008 vms running on a single host (Dell poweredge T610), DAS, 16GB ram about 1 terabye on 4 spindles.  Performance is utterly abysmal, bumped the memory up to 40GB and reallocated the memory to the VMs and its much better.  However I have no real fault tolerance and no ability to balance the load to a second host.  Automatic VMotion would be great to balalnce the load among hosts, but I don't have access to a NAS, nor the funds for one in 2011.  I do however have a second server, an HP ML370G5 that was recently retired from acting as a XenServer host on another network.  44GB Ram and about a terabyte of DAS.  Problem is how to make use of it.  I've installed ESX 4.1 on this new box but I can't find a way to get the vSphere client to give me access to both hosts so I cna move powered off VMs between them...most of my virtual server experience was confined to Xenserver which made this process surprisingly easy to do as well as free, logically VMWare has a way to do this but I simply cannot figure it out.  I know wihtout a NAS I will have to power off the VM when I move it and I can live with that, but I just can't seem to get my head around the process.

Its a small network, about 40 desktops, 4 server VM's, simple copper gigabit switched environment, no VLANS, no port groups...just plug and play type stuff, class C internal IP4, all Windows servers and clients.

I've tried reaching out VM support as we bought a 3 year support contract when they bought the existing server, but after playing tag with some guy from India for a week who never leaves me any return contact information, I'm seemingly forced to abandon making use of the support that we paid good money for and doing this on my own.  I'm hoping someone here can help me.

I'm not sure what other information I should be providing here, so if this is incomplete, feel free to request more info.

Thank you.

[vmroyale]

Hello.

You will need a vCenter Server to manage these two hosts the way you describe.

Good Luck!

[doyletim]

Do I have to pay for that in addition to my ESX or is it an addon?

[weinstein5]

There are really two pieces to this - you will have to license the ESX server approriately and license vCenter - VMware has what they call as the essentials bunder for someone like yourself - here is a comparison chart about the different essential levles -http://www.vmware.com/products/vsphere/small-business/buy.html 

[idle-jam]

vcenter is an addon, you need to purchase the vSphere standard at minimum level. if you want bundled then refer to the above essential bundle that comes with vcenter as well as 6 CPU license.

[doyletim]

According to my invoice I own vSphere 4 Essential Plus Bundle - 3 hosts (2 proc each).  The online liceinsing applet at VM shows a license key for vCenter so I think I do own what I need.  Each of my 2 physical hosts has 2 physical processors each (one is dual core, the other is quad), so if I understand the licensing that means I'm all set to use ESX and not ESXi on the second host, right?  Its physical processors, not cores that are licensed.

So now I need to dig into the vCenter documentation and figure out how this thing works and I'm on my way!  Or am I still missing something?

I appreciate the help guys!

[vmroyale · Accepted solution]

The three hosts can be ESX or ESXi, and are limited to 2 physical procs each - the cores don't matter in your case.

If you don't have hardware, install vCenter in a virtual machine.  The doumentation is great, so you should be all set.

[idle-jam]

download the vcenter essential get it install and add it to managed the hosts. all you need is just read the f*cking manual 😃 happy virtualizing.

[doyletim]

^^ Precisely what I'm doing now.  Thanks everyone!