vSphere Editions and Features Flashcards
Standard Edition
- HA and FT (Fault Tolerance) for 2vCPUS
- Data protection (VDP) / replication (Vsphere Replication) DR
- WOLs/SPBM (Storage Policy Based Management) (Virtual Volumes) (Virtual aware storage) (Manage Storage based on virtual machine)
- Content library
HA
High availability for tier 1 servers
FT
Fault tolerance for for failed physical cpus. vCPU will time out for a moment.
Data Protection or VDP
Backup and recovery application
Vsphere Replication
Software base replication. Used primarily for DR
vVols
Virtual Volumes. Must be supported by storage array. Virtual aware storage. Manage storage based on VM instead of LUN.
SPBM
Storage policy based management. Define policies for a VM. Configure underlying storage with capabilities or Vsphere can talk to the storage with the vsphere API. VASA.
Content Library
A shared area for the vcenter server for ISO images and vapps.
Enterprise Addition
All of Vsphere standard and:
VAAI
DRS/DPM
BDE
VAAI
Vmware API Array Integration. Provides the offload of storage operations to your storage where it belongs. Cloning a VM could be offloaded to the storage. Could be instantaneous for large VMs.
DRS
Distributed Resource Scheduler. Load balancing.
DPM
Distributed power management. Related to DRS. Allows the Datacenter to save on electricity costs. Shuts down ESXI servers when demand is low.
BDE
Big Data Extensions. Companies struggling with big data.
Enterprise Plus edition
All of vSphere Enterprise and:
-FT for 4 vCPUS per protected VM
BDE, vDS, SDRS, NIOC, and SR-IOV
- Host profiles / auto deploy
- Flash read cache
- Cross vCenter and long distance vMotion vGPU.
vDS
vsphere distributed switch
SDRS
Storage distributed resource scheduler. For storage. Ensures your VM receive the storage performance and capacity they require
NIOC
Network IO Control
Host Profiles / Auto deploy
Bring up brand new esxi servers quickly and with the exact same config every time. Allows you to routinely audit esxi servers.
Flash read cache
FRC. requires ssd on each esxi server where you have VMs you want to enable flash read cache. Can speed up storage IO throughput for read IO.
Cross vCenter
Ability to migrate VM’s across vcenters.
Long Distance vMotion
Allos for Vmotions to any vcenter in the environment.
vGPU
Virtual graphic Processing units. High end graphic performance.
All Editions
sold per socket. Per physical CPU in servers. Price goes up based on features.
vSphere Essentials Kit
includes 6 cpu licenses for vSphere essentials. Special license for VMware Vcenter. Never be able to support hundreds of esxi hosts. Limited to 3 servers with up to 2 procs each.
vSphere with operations management (vSOM) -std/ent
standard or enterprise. Includes vmware vsphere plus vrealize operations. Perf and capacity monitoring and management.
vRealize Operations Insight (vROI)
add on to vsphere with operations management. Purchase vSOM and then vROI on top. Adds on to VMware log insight. Log management tool for the entire datacenter.
vCenter
is sold separately. Must have this for other features. In addition to vSphere. Add service and support through VMware.
vSphere 6
Sold per socket/ processor. No Limit on CPU, RAM, or number of VMs. Support and subscription (SnS) are required.
vSAN
Software defined storage dedicated to your VMs. Built in to the sphere hypervisor. Can be turned on with the right license code. Can use local storage on physical esxi servers. Requires both traditional spinning disks and flash disks. Or all flash disks. Requires minimum 3 servers. Unlikely you would need traditional SAN or NAS storage.
Horizon View
VDI solution. Use vSphere infrastructure to virtualize EUC.
vRealize Suite
includes VRO, and VRA, Vrealize business, Vrealize Log insight, Vrealize orchestrator, vRealize hyperic.
Site Recovery Manager (SRM)
DR of virtual infrastructure. Works with hardware or software based replication. Allows you to create DR plans which specifiy which VMs should be recovered to an offsite location.
NSX
network hypervisor. Software defined networking.
vCloud Air
Public cloud solution. Hybrid services. On demand servers. Manage virtual infrastructure through the cloud.
vSphere Architecture
made up of the ESXI hypervisor + advanced features, depending on your license level. Have to purchase the commercial edition of Vsphere. There is a free version, but it has limitations. It can’t be managed by vCenter.
vSphere Architecture
made up of the ESXI hypervisor + advanced features, depending on your license level. Have to purchase the commercial edition of vSphere. There is a free version, but it has limitations. It can’t be managed by vCenter.
vSphere Infrastructure
Installed on top of Compute, storage, and network. These are the building blocks.
Infrastructure Services
- Hypervisor/Esxi.
- Memory Overcommit
- VMFS
- DRS
- Thin provisioning
- Storage & Network I/O control
- vDS
Memory Overcommit
Major differentiator. Allows you to provision more virtual memory than the esxi host actually has. Transparent page sharing, memory compression.
VMFS
vmware file system. Stores virtual machines. Offers best performance when it comes to accessing data.
DRS
Load balancing for CPU and Memory in the Virtual infrastructure. DRS works by ensuring the vms get the resources they need. If they don’t, the VMs are moved without any downtime.
Thin Provisioning
for storage. You may want to provision more storage than you may have available. Set up warnings if all VMs start to use more storage than anticipated.
Storage and Network I/O Control
Throttling I/O to ensure the critical apps get the I/O they deserve.
Distributed Switch (vDS)
Advanced of vsphere standard switch. Centralized management and config of all vswitches on the vnetwork.
Application Services
- vMotion
- Storage vMotion
- High Availability
- Fault Tolerance
- Backup / Recovery
- Replication
- Hot Add
vMotion
Move a running VM to another host. No downtime.
Storage vMotion
Move a running Virtual disk file from one datastore to another. No Downtime.
High Availability
If a physical server fails then another physical server will take over. HA includes insight into the guest OS. HA knows if a windows VM has blue screened and crashed.
Fault Tolerance
If physical server crashes. Ultimate HA. The VM that is protected will stay up on another host with no down time.
Backup / Recovery
vsphere data protection
Replication
through vpshere replication
Hot Add
add ram and vcpus to running VMs.
vCenter Setup
Typically installed on a VM or can be installed on Physical windows server. Centralized point of management for the entire vsphere infrastructure.
VMware vCenter Provides:
- ESXI Host Management
- VM management
- Templates, content library.
- Centralized repository for performance data, statistics, and logs.
- Tasks, events, and alarms.
- Resource management
- API connection for all other virtualization-aware applications
