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enabling EVC when vCenter is a vm on ESXi 5.1

Greetings,

I have read several articles on this but was hoping an expert could look over my steps below and confirm if they are the correct way to do this. Here are links I found helpful:

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1013111

http://thefoglite.com/2012/07/06/configure-evc-using-appropriate-baseline/

here are my steps:

make new cluster and set up EVC (I have an Intel 5540 which appears to be Nehalem and a 5649 which appears to be a Westmere, so I'll choose Nehalem)

move host without vCenter server to the new cluster

close vSphere client connected to vCenter

connect directly to host with vCenter

power off vCenter server

remove from inventory

direct login to host in cluster

add vCenter to inventory on host in cluster

power on

disconnect from hosts

connect to vCenter vSphere client

move other host by drag-and-drop to cluster

enjoy benefits of vMotion

thanks a lot

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Andrew Hancock (VMware vExpert PRO / EE Fellow/British Beekeeper)

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king daddy

ASKER

thanks hanccocka. I thought I could move a powered-on VM to a new cluster in 5.1. Is that incorrect? I thought by creating and enabling EVC on a new cluster with no hosts I could then add hosts to the cluster while VMs are powered on. To be clear, I do not have an existing cluster, only a datacenter with two hosts. Maybe I am not understanding the following from the VMware kb link above just after step 13 correctly:

With vCenter Server 4.1 and 5.0, it is possible to add a host with running virtual machines to an EVC cluster as long as none of the virtual machines on the host are running instructions not supported by the EVC baseline. If any virtual machine is running an instruction not supported by the baseline, a warning displays.

I was hoping to not need to power the VMs off for this but obviously will if required.

Also, can you tell me what will happen when I disconnect the hosts? Is it necessary to disconnect since they are not in an existing cluster?

thanks again

SOLUTION