Upgrading from Essentials to Standard

[Joe69]

Hello all,

This licensing is so confusing to me.

We are trying to upgrade to 7 Standard from Essentials plus. There are more features in standard that are not available in Essentials. (Storage vMotion, Resource Pools, etc.)

At the moment these are our licenses.

Licensing
For our vCenter

License
vCenter Server 7 Essentials Upgrade from V6

Product
vCenter Server 7 Essentials

Usage
1 Instances

License expiration
Never

Licensed features
vSphere Storage Appliance

For our Hosts (we have 2 hosts)

License
vSphere 7 Essentials Plus Upgrade from V6

Product
vSphere 7 Essentials Plus

Usage
2 CPUs (up to 32 cores)

License expiration
Never

Licensed features
Unlimited virtual SMP
H.264 for Remote Console Connections
vCenter agent for VMware host
vSphere API
Content Library
Storage APIs
vSphere vMotion
X-Switch vMotion
vSphere HA
vSphere Data Protection
vShield Endpoint
vSphere Replication
vShield Zones

So what product or products would we need to upgrade to 7 Standard? Our vendor is telling us we need to spend over 25,000 Euros which I find hard to believe if we are just upgrading and we have a valid license that still has support.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

Joe

[jsm79]

This one looks like a job for the VMware Sales Team! Even if you stick with your vendor, maybe a chat/call with VMware Sales will at least point your vendor to a better solution.

https://www.vmware.com/company/contact_sales.html

[a_p_]

What you basically need is a vCenter Server license, and the required number of ESXi Standard CPU licenses (one license per physical CPU with up to 32 cores).
For vCenter Server you may either go with the full featured vCenter Server Standard edition, or the less expensive vCenter Server Foundation edition, which supports up to 4 ESXi hosts. There are also a few features that are only available with the vCenter Server Standard edition. See https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/products/vsphere/vmware-vsphere-pr...

André

[IRIX201110141]

There is only one upgrade path available from a Essentials Plus upwards.  Its named  "Accelerator Kit" and comes as Acce. Kit Standard or Enterprise Plus.  It contains a vCenter and a number of single vSphere ESXi licenses.

Main difference between Essentials Plus and Standard are

1. svMotion
2. FaultTolerance
3. blablabl
4. and most important > 3 Hosts

You pay for the vCenter (that alone costs around 5.5k) and the > 3 Hosts option.

The AccelerKit gives you around addiotions 20% discount compated to the single SKUs.

Regards,
Joerg

[Joe69]

Thanks for all the answers. So basically, what I was thinking. I should be able to just purchase the Accelerator kit Standard. That should come with the vSphere up to 6 cpu's and vCenter server?

We only have 2 hosts at the moment with 2 cpu's each. Don't think we will be expanding anytime soon.

Joe

[IRIX201110141]

Than you should compare the upgrade against new licences

1x vCenter Foundation(limited to max. 4Hosts)
4x vSphere ESXi Std. 1 CPU or EnterprisePlus

If you have a low CPU Core Count consider vSphere+ (similar to Windows Server licensing and starts with 16 cores...)

What was the reason again why you consider change tom other vSphere Features? With such a small environment and not planing to expand i suggest to stay on Essentials Plus.  Btw... yes there is no svMotion. with Essentias Plus....but enchanced svMotion!

Regards,
Joerg

[Joe69]

Hi Joerg,

Looking for Storage vMotion, Storage i/o control, DRS, Resource Pools.

Can't get this with Essentials Plus.

What I found is that the Standard Acc kit has everything I need but not for 25000 Euros!! That is including 3 year support. I thought if you already have support, you could just extend it and not have to purchase new.

Thanks

Joe

[IRIX201110141]

"Storage i/o control, DRS, " are Enterprise Plus Feature and not part of the vSphere ESXi Standard Edition.

To be honest... with a 2 node Cluster iam note sure why you think that you need svMotion*, DRS and so on. Dont get it wrong..  as a person which is responsible for consulting, architecting and managing VMware vSphere Solution for 300 customers in the last 15 years you need to tell me your business needs. Otherwise i think you will waste your money.

About upggrading a vSphere Edition/Product

1. A higher grade VMware product have higher SnS costs because of more Features/functions ans its alway around 25-30% per year based on license price
2. If you buy a upgrade SKU you can buy it together with the minimum "2 month SnS" option. Only new licenses needs 1Y at a minimum or 3 years(gets 12% discount)
3. Your existing SnS will be migrate to the new product for 100% but... because the new one comes with higher costs VMware reduce the existing runtime based on the difference between "New SnS costs" - "Existing SnS Value" = $$$ = number of days to reduce

* Essential Plus included enchanced svMotion which means changing Host+Datastore in one step. It does not include the default svMotion which only allows to change datastore and stay on the same host.

Regards,
Joerg

[Joe69]

HiJoerg,

Thank you so much for your input and knowledge. I just know that some of these vm's were created before my time and some of them have 1-2 TB datastores which is NOT needed. I had to migrate one to a different datastore (i made smaller) had to do it manually moving files.

On the other side, we are having some latency issues and one of the suggestions is to turn on i/o control.

As well as cluster has unbalanced workload..suggestion is to turn on DRS.

We are using vRealize Operations Manager for analyzing.

Also, I wasn't aware of the enhanced svMotion. That is good news. When using this feature and migrating, does the vm stay up or is there downtime?

Thanks again for your help!!

Joe

I think we will wait on the upgrade

[IRIX201110141]

I can confirm that your Ess+ contains ench. svMotion and that you can migrate a VM which is up and running if you choose the 3rd. option from migration menu.

I like DRS and i like more the DRS Rules which used when licensed but.. i none of my customers with 2 node + shared storage have it. With 20-30 VM in total we use a simple Excel sheet(use RVtools) and count the vMem, vCore and than adjust the VMs to the Hosts. A simple Powershell Script is used for a compliance check bases on VM Tags or Custom fields which specify on which Host a VM should run.

Because you only have 2 nodes, 4 cpus and not planing to increase your hardware. Compare new licenses compared to upgrade to vCenter Std. + 6 CPUs.

1. vCenter Foundation
2. 4x ESX Enterprise+
3. 3Y Sns for both

but i think you also whill reach 20K easily. Otherwise ask your VMware Partner for vSphere+ and the current promo about.

When ever you plan your HW refresh. Take a look to single CPU configs like the Xeon 6xxxU which is a price reduced CPU which doesnt support SMP setups. So 3 Hosts with one CPU each are less licensing costs compared to 2 Hosts with 2 CPUs each. A 3 Hosts Cluster have needs only 1/3 of fail over capacity instead 1/2.
But at end of the year or near future every vendor changed to a consumption based modell and not CPU flatrates  any more 😕

Regards,
Joerg