vCenter Server Appliance 5 with vSphere Essentials 5?

[ajonline]

We have a vSphere Essentials 5 license which we had purchased hoping to take advantage of some of the features of vCenter Server.  Our understanding was that a vCenter Server Appliance (VCSA) existed and we wouldn't need a dedicated Windows machine to run the vCenter Server software, but we don't see any option to download the vCenter Server Appliance under the downloads for vSphere Essentials 5.  Can anyone advise if we can download the VCSA from under the vSphere 5 Standard downloads section and use it with our Essentials license?

[brucekconvergen]

Yes, you can use VCSA with the Essentials License --- in the download screen for vCenter Server, click the option to look at older versions -- the appliance has not yet been updated to 5.0 U1, that's why you don't see it at first.  "Plain Old" 5.0 VCSA will work fine with ESXi 5.0 and 5.0U1, so you should be good to go.

[brucekconvergen]

I figured a picture (well, a series of pictures) is worth a thousand words... seems this is a common request:

Click View Download ----

Change Selection to 5.0.0 -----

And Scroll down ----