Basic help with RSM trial please

[Olek]

Hello,

I have two questions about SRM trial. First question is do I need any trial key from VMware? I activated my 60 day trial and got access do VMware RSM trial area, There I see quite old distribution (from 2009) of ESX4.0, VirtualCenter and SRM. My first question do I need any trialkeys/serialnumbers for the products to have fully functional enviroment (SRMtwo ESX4.0VC)? I didnt get any trial serial numbers only access to download. I think I should have to enter trial key during installation and I do not have any at the moment. How this trial license is working? My understanding is that VirtualCenter need trial serial number to function properly. ESX4.0 I think has an option to enter serail or not and if not it will function as a "demo" for some time.

My second question is should I use those code version from SRM trial binaries

VMware ESX 4.0 (CD ISO) Version 4.0.0 | 171294 - 06/22/09

VMware vCenter Server 4 and modules (CD ISO) Version 4.0.0 | 162902 - 05/21/09

or better to use latest production versions?

Thanks a lot!

[Michelle_Laveri · Accepted solution]

Firstly, all VMware products are fully functional within the 60-day period - no special eval license key is required or neccessary. Of course after that you are on a sticky wicket!

Secondly, the binaries on the eval site are the slightly older ones. If you are customer and have valid customer account I would attempt to download the binaries there as you would normally. If not then you will be stuck with the 4.0.0 build instead. The new version does fix some issues but nothing major. For example it fixed my timeout issues with iSCSI. But there are no product changes, so the 4.0.0 should be good enough for eval purposes...

VMware? Can you update the eval page for the new binaries. This is the second question on the forum of this type...

Regards

Mike Laverick

RTFM Education

http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk

Author of the SRM Book:http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/2010/03/22/new-administrating-vmware-site-recovery-manager-4-0/

Free PDF or at-cost Hard Copy

[Olek]

Mike,

thank you so much! I will sleep better now. Problem was I am going to use first time vSphere trial and have no experience with vSphere evaluation. Used to production serials or older trials keys. With previous versions of the VMware in the past I always needed trial keys for VC and ESX. To sort out this matter I even called yesterday VMware US support and they too said I need evaluation keys so was a little bit confused.

I found also and downloaded today Your great book "Site Recovery Manager" (and donated 10+USD to Unicef as you suggested). WIll read it starting today. It is a big pleasure for me to get an answer from SRM book author!

I will spend next two weeks making working demo enviroment of

geocluster using two IBM VCS that will take over two midrange DS5300

storage systems. If you will like to have any of my first hand experience with VCS

and SRM I will gladly help you and provide some info for your next

book update.

Aleksander Siatecki

aleksander.siatecki@pl.ibm.com

[Michelle_Laveri]

How odd...

For sure. If you look at what I have done with the book - I really left slots by which other vendors could be dropped in a later stage. If you did write something to that level - step-by-step how to, what's happens when a recovery plan is tested/executed. I would be happy to include you...

Regards

Mike Laverick

RTFM Education

http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk

Author of the SRM Book:http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/2010/03/22/new-administrating-vmware-site-recovery-manager-4-0/

Free PDF or at-cost Hard Copy

[CHogan]

Don't re-invent the wheel Aleksander.

This guide was written with the assistance of some of your IBM colleagues.

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-11540

HTH

Cormac