Essentials - Standard - Advanced - Enterprise....What's the difference in ESX/ESXi?

[wcrain]

I thought that the VI3 licensing structure was a bit confusing when Foundation came online. vSphere ups that anty.

Technically speaking, what is different about ESX across the licensing schemes? I need ESX only....not HA, not fault tolerance, not vMotion, not vETC, just ESX. Why can't I use Essentials?

Yes, I want to interact with my ESX servers using a 3rd-party application and yes, I probably want more than 3 of them eventually. I don't care about vCenter or related functionality.

Are the exposed APIs on an Essentials licensed ESX different than Standard?

Thanks,

Will

[MHAV]

Hi Will,

check out this Dokument for the difference between the Version of vSphere.

Key Features and Benefits

Well the API´s are the same if you have the feature licensed you want to use.

Regards

Michael

[TomHowarth]

if you just need ESX why not just use free ESXi, How ever you are intimating that you need to have access to the API's if so then just go for Standard. Why do yon not need vCenter functionality????? it is more than vMotion, HA, DRS etc.

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author for the upcoming book "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780136083214]”. Currently available on roughcuts

[wcrain]

Hi Michael.

I retrieved the document you referenced. It does a good job of illustrating the various services and capabilities available across the various vSphere licenses, but I didn't find anything that referred to Essentials.

I've searched through the VMware site to little or no avail. It would appear that Essentials is a dead-end package for a small operation that can't get what they need from ESXi, but will never need more than 3 content hosts or want to interact with any other software. I'm not sure what type of operation that is.

Though the technical details were not shared with me, it does appear that the APIs required to be able to interact with/manage ESX from a 3rd party perspective are different in Essentials from all other license levels (Standard and up).

I suppose the rule of thumb that applies here is just to keep on looking at Standard as an entry-level offering and ignore the shiny bits over there.

Thanks,

Will

[wcrain]

Tom,

I appreciate your post, but I think you missed the point of my question.

First, ESXi and ESX are not the same. I have a requirement for the service console that ESXi doesn't provide.

Second, I'm not intimating anything. My message stated I needed API support. I'm not using vCenter. I am using another product that serve my requirements and gives me the necessary oversight to not need vCenter.

The question I asked was what is technically different about the ESX server that is included in the Essentials package and the similarly listed ESX server that is included in other license levels, Standard and above?

All of the documentation that I have found refer to ESX as "ESX" regardless of the license level. I have an engineer telling me that they are not the same when considering how they can be managed from a 3rd party perspective. To me, that sounds like ESX is not ESX if it is licensed under Essentials. We all know ESXi isn't ESX. Is ESX licensed under Essentials actually "ESX-restricted" or "ESX-lite"? Is this the reason why there is no upgrade path?

Thanks for your response.

Will

[TomHowarth]

The only functionality difference I can see is the limitation to 3 three instances, but as far as I can tell this limitation is tied to the vCenter instance. the Downloads are in actuality the same.

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author for the upcoming book "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780136083214]”. Currently available on roughcuts

[wcrain]

Tom,

I agree....it would appear that the only difference is the limit to three instances using vCenter for Essentials. This is why I am asking. I am told by engineers that have done testing that some/all of the API functions under an Essentials license are read-only or otherwise not usable as the same APIs licensed under Standard or better. I'm not arguing with that, I'd just like to know why it is different and what the differences (limitations) actually are.

Will

[TomHowarth]

if that is the case then it is a limitation built into the new licensing management, to switch of and on features depending which license key is entered

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author for the upcoming book "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780136083214]”. Currently available on roughcuts