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SuperSpike
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vSphere 5 Licensing

I took a minute to read the licensing guide for vSphere 5 and I'm still trying to pull my jaw off the floor. VMware has completely screwed their customers this time. Why?

What I used to be able to do with 2 CPU licenses now takes 4. Incredible.

Today

BL460c G7 with 2 sockets and 192G of memory = 2 vSphere Enterprise Plus licenses
DL585 G7 with 4 sockets and 256G of memory = 4 vSphere Enterprise Plus licenses

Tomorrow

BL460c G7 with 2 sockets and 192G of memory = 4 vSphere Enterprise Plus licenses
BL585 G7 with 4 sockets and 256G of memory = 6 vSphere Enterprise Plus licenses


So it's almost as if VMware is putting a penalty on density and encouraging users to buy hardware with more sockets rather than less.

I get that the vRAM entitlements are for what you use, not necessarily what you have, but who buys memory and doesn't use it?

Forget the hoopla about a VM with 1 TB of memory. Who in their right mind would deploy that using the new license model? It would take 22 licenses to accommodate! You could go out and buy the physical box for way less than that today, from any hardware vendor.

Anyone else completely shocked by this move?

@Virtual_EZ
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aroudnev
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Contributor

Excellent analyze.

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Dracolith
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Enthusiast

Radio1 wrote:

Lets Build a car for the us that has an absolute top speed of 50mph.

To back up from less important matters and sum it up.... vRAM is a "usage based metric", that's not really an accurate usage based metric for Enterprises.

It's like paying someone the same price to haul an empty trailer as the same price of hauling a full

trailer at say 100 tons,  because the   "vWeight" of the empty trailer is the same  (the trailer has been configured so that

it can carry a certain weight, and that much is charged whether that much is carried or not).

If I create 100 VMs and allocate each one 1gb of  RAM, and power them all on, and they

all actually use  400mb of RAM,  but  some percentage of the VMs that I cannot predict in advance

actually  require the full 1gb,   then

The "vRAM license usage"  for a standard  Enterprise license,  is  the same  as if  ALL the VMs required

the full 1gb all the time.

"Right size the VMs"   is also not a good answer, IMO.

Every VM always needs to have enough RAM to meet its peak load,  or there are negative performance impacts,

which make virtualization unattractive.  Not all VMs necessarily have peak memory requirements at the same time.

In short...  VMware could end a lot of complaints by  replacing "vRAM"  with

"Utilization adjusted vRAM"

For example, if a VM has been configured for 10gb,

but only  1gb is  "consumed" or "active",    then only the

average of the consumed and active portions count as utilized vRAM.

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aroudnev
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In short

ESX4 has 256GB per 2 cpu server limitation imposed thru RAM (so VRAM can be even more), all 3 - free, essential, enterprise

ESX5 has more strict vRAM per 2 cpu server limitation - 16 / free, 48 / essential, 64 / enterprise.

What we can talk about after this? - this means 16x (free) or 5x (essential) or 4x (enterprise) degradation. POINT. No tales about we integrate and other bullshit - ESX5 degrade systems from 16x to 4x times.

Nothing to discuss about it - competitors are happy.

It's the same as have Subaru 2000 year with max speed 120 mph and sustained speed 80 mph, and then make a new Subaru 2011 with maximum speed of 30 mph for standard trim and say but you can purchase luxary trim with 60 mph limitation and prettend that it is improvement. It is clear degradation.

(Even if we count vRAM use == RAM use which is not true, vRAM is usually 2x RAM on development and test systems, sometimes even more then 2x).

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tomaddox
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I think you can find an accurate portrayal of the issue here: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/11/11/bofh_2011_episode_17/.

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bluelinenetwork
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So, not to be the bearer of bad news, but does everyone realize they have changed the amount of vram?  It's now 32/64/96gb?

Not that it saves the world, but it's an improvement.  Also take into consideration that it's an average UTILIZATION not allocation, it may notbe that bad.

I know my small vSphere has a load on memory for probably about 6-8 hours a day, as do most businesses.

So we'll say they peak 25% of the time right?  the other 75% of the daily average will keep your utilization numbers lower and you'll  probably be ok considering its for the entire pool and not per host.

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IT_Architect
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So, not to be the bearer of bad news, but does everyone realize they have  changed the amount of vram?  It's now 32/64/96gb?

How does that pertain to the free  version?

Also take into  consideration that it's an average UTILIZATION not allocation, it may notbe that  bad.

It started at 8 GB.  We're all weary of doing our licensing homework, and aren't listening so good anymore so you're going to have to back that up.  Last read, not long ago, it was spelled out quite clearly and with examples that you couldn't even start another VM if the total memory declared for all running VMs would exceed the 32GB barrier.  That means you could not use 5, 8 GB, virtual machines running at the same time even if all of them put together were actually only using 16 GB.  If what you are saying is true, it's a big difference.

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tomaddox
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bluelinenetworks wrote:

So, not to be the bearer of bad news, but does everyone realize they have changed the amount of vram?  It's now 32/64/96gb?

Not that it saves the world, but it's an improvement.  Also take into consideration that it's an average UTILIZATION not allocation, it may notbe that bad.

You know how I know you haven't read this thread? Okay, so it's 122 pages, and you can't really be blamed for not reading the whole thing, but your first point has been addressed. To summarize: yes, we know, and we're still annoyed albeit not outraged as was the case initially. In re: your second point, you're wrong. Licensing is based on allocated vRAM, not utilized. If it were based on utilization, that would actually be less annoying because it would reflect actual usage, but that is not the case (you can go reread the new license structure--I'll wait).

To reiterate a point made elsewhere in this thread, probably repeatedly, the tax on vRAM allocation is frustrating because most of us have to allocate RAM to VMs based on a theoretical maximum usage of that VM. Sure, most of the time that RAM will go unused, but we pay for the allocation anyway. That's why we're cranky, and that's why we're all evaluating competing technologies.

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admin
Immortal
Immortal

It's a hard 32GB allocated limit for ESXiFree

Blog post testing 32GB limit

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IT_Architect
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

It's a hard 32GB allocated limit for ESXiFree

Yes, and no matter how many processors, cores, or threads you have, it will use them all.

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bcpss21202
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Bluelinenetworks,

We are all aware of the changes that have been made. What I don't think some of us are aware of is the fact that those changes have come due to venues such as this and other individual or group expressions of discord and outrage at the original pricing scheme VMware attempted to force on its consumers. While the changes, recent or earlier, have met the needs of some it very obviously still does not meet the needs of nor satisfy the majority. We should always be vigilant in the case of software vendors because basically they are in business to make money. Much like the recent financial fiascos in Real Estate, Wall Street and the Banking Institutions, if we allow, the software vendors will take us to the proverbial "Cleaners" if we fail to monitor and or continually voice our displeasure at their efforts to treat us as mindless sheep. To close my reply, yes there have been recent changes, I will wager there will be more adjustments to their pricing structure as VMware acknowledges that going forward they will need to do a better job at market research and at surveying their customer base before making such another blunder at revamping pricing based on consumer use, product acceptance or market share.

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bluelinenetwork
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You are correct sir, on the configured.  I read the compliance peice which does read to me at least that you can over use for part of a day and then shut down and it will use that for compliance.  So, (brain fart on feature name) if your VM's shut down when not needed, (vpower?) your average could be below that of the cap.

Maybe an idea would be for vMware to sell a vram upgrade seperate from full license?  I think it is somewhat understandable, sucks, but yea.  In physical world you couldn't add RAM without ya know, buying RAM.  The sad part is that 96gb of physical RAM is what $2,000 at most, adding a license @ $3500 kinda stings, but in the end, $5500 to spin up 8 new systems with 12gb ram each, really not too much of a cost in my book and has to be better than physical hardware pricing.

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bluelinenetwork
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Contributor

Agreed 100%, I think we all let MSFT do it too long.

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ClueShell
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but in the end, $5500 to spin up 8 new systems with 12gb ram each,

really not too much of a cost in my book and has to be better than

physical hardware pricing.

That is exactly what VMware is "educating" the market. Yo! We're still

the cheaper option as to buy much more hardware. With all the buzz about

TCO and ROI they are not confident being only a virtualization

guy. They have a huge stack for many niches, which of them are

profitable?

I would bet all are (or get near) a profitable level, its just VMware

wants more out of it because competition is catching up fast.

I could use some advanced monitoring solution that ramps up (hot add)

more vRAM to a live instance and reclaim this vRAM after peak has ended.

Monitoring, being a "re-act" solution will always be late to the game.

The system gets more complex, I see no good TCO in that. But I'm sure

VMware has some advisor plugin for vCenter to 'rightsize' your VMs for

the '90-95% timeframe'.

Developer VMs could have a powershell script or the like to activate

more resources before they start a memory hungry release build (java

really likes the file cache and write back mode).

But everything that can be done to optimize this stupid license change

is time consuming.

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ChipE201110141
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I am out of the office until Thursday, 1st

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LockAze
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$5500 for 8 new systems. with only 12gb ram each.... cheap? seriously?

If I calculate correct it's marginally cheaper than to just actually buy 8 relativly cheap servers with 12gb ram each... And that is not what I would call cheap. I'm trying hard to find a way for me to make it cheap, but I just can't seem to find it... I'm sorry...

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hmtk1976
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VMware is probably correct that the current vRAM entitlements wont be a problem for the majority of their customers.  Right now that is.  RAM usage increases at a considerable pace so within 1 or 2 years what isn't a problem wil become a serious one unless VMware increases the vRAM limits.  For some reason I don't trust them in this.  They'll need to communicate clearly and well in advance what their plans will be.  Twice they've shafted their customers, which is twice too much.  At least when Microsoft changes licensing they grandfather existing licenses and they communicate on time. (you can play the system if you've got SQL under SA now if you're interested)

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J1mbo
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

@hmth1976, I completely with that analysis, indeed I wrote as much in my analysis of the position at the start of August.

The licensing models depends on two things:

  1. that IT workers are too financially inept to realise that signing up to vSphere is signing up to a DOUBLING of license costs for that (commoditised) component every 18 months, and

  2. that IT budget holders are too technically inept to realise that RAM requirements DOUBLE every 18 months.

I never received my vExpert welcome pack..., I wonder why.

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20thCB
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vSphere 5.0 licensing won't affect a lot of companies.

Enterprise licensing allows 64GB VRAM per CPU. An average server these days has 2 cpus and 6 cores each. So that's 128GB of VRAM and 12 cores. I would probably only run maybe 10 VMs on the host anyway. Most of them use 4GB or less of VRAM. So that's 40GB maximum.

So the move from 3.5 to 5.0 has cost us nothing in extra licensing as we already had 3.5 enterprise. Many companies will be in the same boat.

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Rumple
Virtuoso
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That’s a pretty low oversubscription rate if you consider that back in esx 2.5 the recommendation was 4-5 vcpu’s per Core and with esx 4.1 it was 20-25 vCPU’s per core….

12 cores * 5 vCPU (esx 2.5 rate) = 60 VM’s…obviously that’s going pretty crazy, but realistically the CPU is not the problem

I have 3 servers running 2xquad core with 48gb of RAM in an N+1 design and I run 50 odd VM’s with a vCPU count of 80 across 8 cores with hyperthreading. Allocated RAM = 162GB (since I can’t actually tell my clients how to size their VM’s now can I)

Average CPU usage is about 30-40% on the hosts, ram usage is high at about 50%-70%....but I think most of that is the TPS large pages in Windows 2008

I am running a mix of SQL (sharepoint environment for 500 users), Exchange (250 mailboxes) , Terminal Services (100 concurrent users) and I would say I am at the upper limit of pushing that environment any more before I have problems.

So…allocated RAM would be pretty bad in that environment cost wise…for the vspp at least they use 50% of the allocated RAM as the billing number, but it still hurts compared to v4.1 pricing…

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hmtk1976
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20thCB wrote:

vSphere 5.0 licensing won't affect a lot of companies.

Enterprise licensing allows 64GB VRAM per CPU. An average server these days has 2 cpus and 6 cores each. So that's 128GB of VRAM and 12 cores. I would probably only run maybe 10 VMs on the host anyway. Most of them use 4GB or less of VRAM. So that's 40GB maximum.

So the move from 3.5 to 5.0 has cost us nothing in extra licensing as we already had 3.5 enterprise. Many companies will be in the same boat.

If you run a mere 10 VM's a dual socket hexacore machine you're on the low end of the virtualization world.  Even my customers (SMB's) aren't very heavy in virtualization.  The biggest one has about 30 servers on an "old" dual socket quad core Nehalem.  If most of your VM's use 4 GB or less RAM then I'd guess you're not running a lot of 64-bit machines.  4 GB is the MINIMUM I give to a VM these days unless for some reason it has to be a 32-bit thing.  SQL and Exchange servers start at 8 GB RAM.

Imagine existing customers that were fine with vSphere Standard features (or Essentials Plus) and loaded dual socket machines with RAM.  The paltry 32 GB they now get per socket pales in comparison to 144 or 192 GB that's become quite affordable in a system like that.  In, say, a 3 host cluster with dual socket machines with 192 GB RAM each you'd need 12 Standard licenses instead of only 6 now.  With Essentials Plus you're stuck at only 192 GB on the cluster.  If you need more you have to buy (not upgrade but BUY) to vSphere Standard and at least vCenter Foundation which is somewhat more expensive than Essentials Plus.

With vSphere 4 licensing VMware introduced Enterprise Plus which required existing users to purchase an upgrade if they had Enterprise  -even with SnS.  Now they do another silly thing.  We're going to keep on selling vSphere but when Windows 8 goes RTM we will be ready for Hyper-V 3.

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