VMware's ESXi vs Dell's Customized ESXi

[uni-hacker]

I'm in the process of consolidating all our servers (P2V). My question is what ESXi distro should I use for my servers VMware's or Dell's Customized? We currently own vSphere Essentials and yesterday 4.0 update 2 was released. What will be my safest/reliable and recommended approach.

Hardware:

2x Dell PowerEdge R510 (ESXi via USB)

1x Dell PowerEdge 2850 (vCenter)

Current Options:

1) Use ESXi 4u2 and vCenter 4u2 directly from VMware's site.

2) Use ESXi 4u1 (Dell Customized) and vCenter 4u2 from VMware's site. (the Dell ESXi 4u2 is not available)

3) Use ESXi 4u1 (Dell Customized) from Dell's site and vCenter 4u2 from VMware's site.

4) Another idea???

Thank for any help!

[athlon_crazy]

Since you are going to put these into production, precaution is better than cure. Play safe, wait until you get people feedback first on regard to this U2. I still can't forget 3.5 U2 and 4 U1 w/out .a timebomb last time.

vcbMC-1.0.6 Beta

vcbMC-1.0.7 Lite

http://www.no-x.org

[JimKnopf99]

hi,

normaly the only different are the Hardware monitoring tools that are included in Hardware vendor Special versions of esxi.

Because you should Not install any tools Ehen using esxi (no Service console).

If you do Not Need that, install the VMware Version.

If you need that, install the Hardware vendor Version

frank

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[uni-hacker]

Thanks for the reply.

So my other question is why it the Dell Customized version on VMware site different from the version on Dell download site? VMware's version is 228255 and Dell's version is 244038. Does the Dell one just contain more resent patches?

[AndreTheGiant · Accepted solution]

The Dell version has the right CIM (but the one from the vanilla version works also well) and the Dell OpenManage ready to be run.

You can add this tool later or start from the Dell U1 version and use VMware Update Manager to upgrade it to the U2 version.

Andre

[uni-hacker]

Thanks for the help! I ended up going with the ESXi download from Dell's site. It appeared to be the same as VMware's Dell customized download; however, it had some urgent updates already included. I'm supprised that VMware and Dell don't keep these syncronized better. So for the future I'll check with Dell's site first and compair their version against VMware's version.