VMotion CPU Compatibility - Intel 53xx and 54xx

[chris_delaney]

Dear All,

My existing ESX hosts all have Intel 53xx-based CPUs (Clovertown) and I wish to buy another host. Resellers are telling me to go for the 54xx-based CPUs now (Harpertown), however, the VMWare VMotion compatibility matrix says that the two are incompatible unless you use the SSE4.1 bit-mask which is not supported.

Has anybody tried to use VMotion between these two CPU families in a production environment to see if there are problems?

Many thanks.

Chris

[Rubeck]

What version are you running? If Update 2 you can create a EVC Cluster http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1003212.

Otherwise chech this current thread http://communities.vmware.com/message/1061969#1061969

/Rubeck

[chris_delaney]

I'm running ESX 3.5 (not update 2).

[chris_delaney]

The EVC clustering looks good - have you tried it?

[Rubeck]

No, I have not... I've only got U2 running in a test enviroment, where all hosts are identical..

/Rubeck