vCenter Server down - what functionality is lost?

[ross_cav]

I'm really sorry if this has been answered before, I'm sure it has, but what I didn't seem to find exactly what I was looking for when searching for this.

If I loose connection to vCenter, and I've got vSphere Enterprise Plus licensing, what features / functions would I loose while vCenter is down? Is it only DRS and nothing else, or would some other fuctionality be lost that requires vCenter?

Thanks in advance, and sorry again if this is re-hashing old news.

Main environment is 5.0 however looking to move to 5.1.

[vmstoani]

bb

[memaad · Accepted solution]

Hi,

If vCenter server is down, you  wont be able to do vMotion, Storage vMotion,  HA, DRS, Update Manager. Also you wont be able to user VDR or VDP.

Regards

Mohammed

[vGuy]

-> no vMotions therefore no DRS although HA is not dependent on vCenter.

-> no modifications to dvSwitch or dvPortgroups...this will only impact if you're using dvSwitch

-> also no cloning option (I guess)

-> cannot create or apply host profiles

in essence, no impact to running VMs or failover of the host

[vGuy]

If vCenter server is down, you  wont be able to do vMotion, Storage vMotion,  HA, DRS, Update Manager. Also you wont be able to user VDR or VDP.

I guess you had a typo there..HA will still work.

[memaad]

Hi,

I think if vCenter goes down during ESXI host failure, then HA will trigger. If  vcenter server machine goes down individually then I dont think HA will work.

Regards

Mohammed

[ross_cav]

Yeah, I thought the HA still functioned OK. But thanks for the listing of other things.

We do use vDS.

Of course, don't expect it to be down for a long time, running as a VM itself, just wanted to get an idea of what we'd loose out on really. But seems like if you have a decent running environment, there wouldn't be an overly huge impact on it until you recovered the vCenter. I guess that's why it's designed that way.

[depping]

Correction:

HA will function okay, you just can't make any configuration changes at that point.

So, if vCenter is down and a host crashes then HA will still fail-over virtual machines. HA works independent of vCenter when it comes to restarting virtual machines.

[memaad]

Hi Duncan,

Thank for correction .

Regards

Mohammed