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Jared2350
Contributor
Contributor

Hi, I am looking into creating one server with vsphere enterprise. Will I lose out on anything if I dont also buy vcenter?

Some back round we are upgrading our servers so that they all fit into one box. We have a solid works machine that will also be on this box. It needs to see a GPU in order for it to even run. I got a quote from a re-seller that says I also need vcenter standard, but from what I read I don't need this. I will take any information That You have on this. Thanks for your help and time

Jared W.

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ThompsG
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Hi Jared2350​ and welcome to the community!

Not sure what you are trying here. It‘s a lot of money to buy vSphere Enterprise Plus but not connect it to vCenter. With vCenter you can fully utilise the features you are paying for however you don’t actually require vCenter - most Enterprise Plus features will not be available until connected to vCenter.

If it’s the vGPU option that is the driver for Enterprise Plus, then how about deploying a host with the evaluation license - this will be Enterprise Plus so you can confirm if the feature will be available without vCenter.

Kind regards.

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Jared2350
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for the welcome. From what I know, and have been told. In order for the clients to see a pysical gpu (which is required for solid works) It needs to be that enterprise plus. I can't use the free version because I have two CPUs, and the free version does not support that. Thanks for your response. I hope this clears up my question a little.

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ThompsG
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Hi Jared,

No limitations on the number of processors with the free version. Limited to 8 vCPU but no physical limit Smiley Happy

Of course, as you highlighted, this is not the issue - vGPU is. As mentioned above (corrected my previous post before seeing your response), try the evaluation version of vSphere. This will be an Enterprise Plus license so you can confirm if vGPU is available without vCenter.

Kind regards.

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Jared2350
Contributor
Contributor

Awesome you confirmed my suspicions! I'm glad I was correct. You just saved my company about 7k. Thanks for your amazing help!

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IRIX201110141
Champion
Champion

1. Instead of buying vCenter Standard you can go for vCenter Foundation (limit to max. 4 Hosts) and way cheaper than the big one

2. We use vGPU.. yes you need Enterprise Plus on paper... and yes we use it together with Horizon VDI. Normal RDP doenst doesnt work. Not sure how it works on a single non VDI Host. Bring in GPU into the VM is one.... get accelerated GFX out something completly different.

You should use the trial version and test you special use case. Iam sure a lot of ppl use the free Hypervisor together with PCI Passtrough or together wie the cheap vSphere Essentials (to get Backup APIs).

Keep in mind that its not possible to create a Snapshot from a VM with a pastrough Device... so no Backup. You need some traditional Agent inside.

Regards

Joerg

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