vSphere 5.1 Announced!
Lot of great announcements this morning during the VMworld keynote. One of these being the official announcement of vSphere 5.1 and there are already a number of blogs out there posting information on many of the new features and enhancements. Here are just a few of the new features and enhancements I am looking forward to:
- Enhanced Web Client
- Enhanced vMotion (Shared storage no longer necessary < face melting stuff!)
- Lots of virtual Distributed Switch enhancements (LACP, vDS backup and restore)
- Virtual Data Protection (VDR replacement based on EMC AVAMAR technology)
- Reboots no longer necessary after guest VMware Tool upgrades (makes this VM admin very much happy!)
- Licensed by physical CPU socket – No vRAM licensing!
- and more…
You can find a good overview of the new features of vSPhere 5.1 here http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/products/vsphere/vmware-what-is-new-vsphere51.pdf and vCenter Server 5.1 here http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/Whats-New-VMware-vCenter-Server-51-Technical-Whitepaper.pdf
I have had the vSphere 5.1 beta installed in my Home Lab for some time now but have not had a lot of time mess with it much. The new Web Client is pretty slick and it seems to have all the functionality of the Windows vSphere Client. The vDS backup and restore is also a great feature. Going to have to make some time to work with it a bit more.
Of course once the NDA curtain was lifted the blog post started flying. Here are a few post that dive a bit deeper into the 5.1 release.
- VMware What’s New Document Index from Yellow-Bricks.com (Some issues with this site because of high traffic)
- vSphere Data Protection Overview at 2vcps and a truck
- VMworld 2012: VMware vSphere 5.1 Delivers New Features for SMBs
- Jason Nash What’s New in the vSphere Distributed Switch?
- New 5.1 vDS Feature Deep Dive – Network Health Check
- New 5.1 vDS Feature Deep Dive – Configuration Backup and Rollback
- New 5.1 vDS Feature Deep Dive – Port Mirror and Netflow Enhancements
- New 5.1 vDS Feature Deep Dive – LACP, SR-IOV, Elastic Ports, and More
- Setting the record straight on VMware vSphere Data Protection
There will be many more post in the near future so keep an eye out for them!
Some really exciting stuff! What’s your favorite new 5.1 feature?
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Glad to see LACP support without the need for a Nexus 1000v, the SR-IOV is also a really great feature for VDI deploys, and who can forget the vRam gone.