VMware ESXi – What is ESXi and what are its features?
VMware products are generally well-known and simple to explain. VMware ESXi, though, is one of the lesser known products which goes under several different names – just to confuse things. So we’re here to answer two questions:
- In layman’s terms - what is VMware ESXi?
- Why should I care – what can it bring me?
What is VMWare ESXi?
VMware ESXi is a purpose-built, bare-metal hypervisor which is currently an industry-leading service due to its large array of features. It is enterprise rather than individual software, and that is heavily reflected in its design. It is placed directly onto a physical server which means that it can be separated into several virtual machines, drastically reducing the need for hardware purchase, upgrade or upkeep.
The initials ES refer to ‘Elastic Sky’ which was the initial marketing-related word given to the software. The ‘I’ stands for integrated, since this version of the software can be integrated into a small bit of flash memory. And the ‘X’? It is the best bit of them all. The ‘X’ is there because it makes it sound cooler and more technical. And that is not a joke.
It’s one of those beautiful examples of where the marketing and R&D departments meet. At least they did not call it the ESi 3000!
Advantages of VMWare ESXi?
One of the major advantages of VMware ESXi is that the architecture considerably simplifies the process of maintaining a consistent virtual infrastructure. It’s bare-metal, core-feature model means that there are few configuration options.
Though this could potentially be viewed as a downside, it is the VMware equivalent of having a control panel with 5 buttons instead of 50. Yes, there are fewer features and less customisation options available but it is also far more user friendly. A virtual infrastructure that is easy to maintain is a true boon for any company.
The security of VMware ESXi is perhaps more important than how user friendly it is. The management functionality is built into the VMkernel, and provides a 150MB footprint which is very hard to accurately attack with malware and other threats, meaning that the system is very secure against threats – as well as being more reliable in a day-to-day sense.
In order to perform administration tasks, there is also no need for one large admin account and instead individual accounts can be assigned certain roles and privileges. This means that one compromised account needn’t mean complete disaster.
In a mixture of security and administrative features, VMware ESXI keeps a detailed log of all user activity to ensure user accountability and easy, error-free auditing.
Management of VMware ESXi is handled via APIs, which means that an agentless approach requires no additional installation or licenses for management options. Remote command lines like the vSphere Command Line Interface and PowerCLI enable commanding and scripting in a far more precise, fast, and controlled way for configuration and diagnostics.
VMware ESXi also allows virtual machines created by Microsoft Virtual Server, Microsoft Virtual PC, or VMware Server to operate on ESXi, and also supports conversions from physical machines and some other third-party sources.
What is required to run VMware ESXi?
You’ll need at the bare minimum a single socket with two cores which will provide enough of a CPU edge to literally have VMware ESXi work. For best results, it is recommended that at a minimum there are dual 1GbE network adapters. The barebones memory required is 4GB, with a recommended minimum of 8GB.
Though VMware ESXi is a free hypervisor, it also has a paid alternative with a host of extra features such as the pooling of computing and storage resources across multiple physical hosts, higher levels of service and efficiency, live migration of machines, automatic load balancing, business continuity, and advanced backup and restore of virtual machines, and much more.
Limits of VMWare ESXi?
Put simply, it can support up to 128 virtual CPUs, and up to 4TB of RAM. These numbers are pretty considerable, and a single VMware ESXi platform can safely handle most network operations in even the largest enterprise.
Hopefully, VMware ESXi has been demystified a bit, and can take its pride of place once again in the ranks of the better-known VMware products available to enterprise.
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