Clarifying VMware operating system support with HP Insight Remote Support (July 2011, 5900-1616)

The following are principles of the remote support environment:

 Remote device monitoring (RDM) is performed on the underlying physical hosts only, not the VMware

Guests.

 Remote data collection (RDC) is supported on the underlying physical host, but only on VMware ESX

and when the VMware ESX server is part of a SAN collection (Insight RSA only). RDC is not

supported for VMware ESXi servers.

 For VMware ESX or ESXi, for either the host or VM Guests, HP currently does not offer proactive

service contracts and hence assessments.

 RDM and RDC is performed on the physical host machines since the management agents and

providers run at this level, not in the VM Guests. The management agents and providers supply the

necessary hardware device entitlement, data collection attributes and events of the physical servers to

the CMS or HD.

 Although the CMS/HD is running in a VMware Guest instance, there is sufficient information in the

form of VMware Guest OS name and unique serial number to enable it to be recognized uniquely

and thereby registered at the HP Datacenter.

 All other monitored endpoint devices are remote support eligible, entitled and enabled by virtue of

the underlying physical host information, including the physical host underlying the CMS or HD.

 The user has direct access to the monitored devices’ underlying physical host for non-virtual operating

systems and classic ESX. In the case of ESXi, which uses an embedded hypervisor, the user does not

have this access.

Central Management Server / Hosting Device support

HP Insight Remote Support Advanced and Standard software is supported on an HP ProLiant running

VMware ESX or ESXi utilizing 32-bit or 64-bit VMware Guests running Microsoft Windows Server 2003

or 2008.

A virtual Central Management Server or Hosting Device is

recognized as a Managed System

When using a CMS/HD running in a VMware Guest, as shown above in Figure 1, the CMS/HD is

discovered as a virtual guest and recognized uniquely and thereby registered at the HP Datacenter. The

underlying physical host is discovered independently and is recognized as a separate endpoint device

supported by Insight Remote Support. Additionally HP SIM will associate the VM Guests with the

underlying physical host. In this configuration, detected service events from the underlying physical host

are sent to HP, in exactly the same way as for all monitored endpoint devices.

The preceding statement applies to both the CMS and HD.