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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCING VMWARE VSPHERE 5

In addition to vCenter Server’s conﬁ guration and management capabilities—which include

features such as VM templates, VM customization, rapid provisioning and deployment of

VMs, role-based access controls, and ﬁ ne-grained resource allocation controls—vCenter Server

provides the tools for the more advanced features of vSphere vMotion, vSphere Distributed

Resource Scheduler, vSphere High Availability, and vSphere Fault Tolerance. All of these fea-

tures are described brieﬂ y in this chapter and in more detail in later chapters.

In addition to vSphere vMotion, vSphere Distributed Resource Scheduler, vSphere High

Availability, and vSphere Fault Tolerance, using vCenter Server to manage ESXi hosts enables a

number of other features:

u Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC), which leverages hardware functionality from

Intel and AMD to enable greater CPU compatibility between servers grouped into vSphere

DRS clusters

u Host proﬁ les, which allow administrators to bring greater consistency to host conﬁ gura-

tions across larger environments and to identify missing or incorrect conﬁ gurations

u Storage I/O Control, which provides cluster-wide quality of service (QoS) controls so that

administrators can ensure that critical applications receive sufﬁ cient I/O resources even

during times of congestion

u vSphere Distributed Switches, which provide the foundation for cluster-wide networking

settings and third-party virtual switches

u Network I/O Control, which allows administrators to ﬂ exibly partition physical NIC band-

width for different types of trafﬁ c

u vSphere Storage DRS, which enables VMware vSphere to dynamically migrate storage

resources to meet demand, much in the same way that DRS balances CPU and memory

utilization

vCenter Server plays a central role in any sizable VMware vSphere implementation. In Chapter

3, “Installing and Conﬁ guring vCenter Server,” I discuss planning and installing vCenter Server

as well as look at ways to ensure its availability. Chapter 3 will also examine the differences

between the Windows-based version of vCenter Server and the Linux-based vCenter Server

virtual appliance. Because of vCenter Server’s central role in a VMware vSphere deployment, I’ll

touch on vCenter Server in almost every chapter throughout the rest of the book. Refer to Table 1.1

previously in this chapter for speciﬁ c cross-references.

vCenter Server is available in three packages:

u vCenter Server Essentials is integrated into the vSphere Essentials kits for small ofﬁ ce

deployment.

u vCenter Server Standard provides all the functionality of vCenter Server, including provi-

sioning, management, monitoring, and automation.

u vCenter Server Foundation is like vCenter Server Standard but is limited to managing three

ESXi hosts and does not include vCenter Orchestrator or support for linked-mode operation.

You can ﬁ nd more information on licensing and product editions for VMware vSphere in the

section “Licensing VMware vSphere.”

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