VMWare EVALExperience: Legit Home Lab VMWare Licensing!!!!

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CreoleLakerFan

Active Member
Oct 29, 2013
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Nice find. I just signed up for this.

I am in the middle of a lab buildout for my VCP studies, but was having serious misgivings about how to proceed after the 60 day eval. I work for a SP-level partner, but have been thus unsuccessful in obtaining an NFR license (not in the cloud group). I do have access to the 60-day renewable demo licenses, but it's a pain to have to constantly re-up, and sometimes the licenses aren't refreshed immediately on the partner site. I have a WS 10 license, and had looked at an Essentials license for vcenter, but neither unlock features needed for a lab and I was not about to shell out $5k for Essentials Plus.
 
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luckylinux

New Member
Mar 18, 2012
27
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200$ per what you get seems like a real bargain to me.
One question though: one user license entitles you to how many hosts / CPUs? I own quite a few servers I would like to test these products on but I'm not sure if I can use more than one host per user. Does anyone have any insights?
 

Mike

Member
May 29, 2012
482
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EU
200$ per what you get seems like a real bargain to me.
One question though: one user license entitles you to how many hosts / CPUs? I own quite a few servers I would like to test these products on but I'm not sure if I can use more than one host per user. Does anyone have any insights?
$200 versus what you normally pay for the same software, yes. However, with the forced relicensing every year and non-production use I could think of better bargains.
Are all of you aspiring/currently VMware techs? Apart from vsphere and the distributed storage the software is more suited for non-test deployments I recon.

If there was only a dislike button.
 

F1ydave

Member
Mar 9, 2014
137
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200$ per what you get seems like a real bargain to me.
One question though: one user license entitles you to how many hosts / CPUs? I own quite a few servers I would like to test these products on but I'm not sure if I can use more than one host per user. Does anyone have any insights?
I am curious about this too.
 

Entz

Active Member
Apr 25, 2013
269
62
28
Canada Eh?
$200 versus what you normally pay for the same software, yes. However, with the forced relicensing every year and non-production use I could think of better bargains.
Are all of you aspiring/currently VMware techs? Apart from vsphere and the distributed storage the software is more suited for non-test deployments I recon.

If there was only a dislike button.
Please do tell what better bargain you had in mind? I have not seen a way to get legal licenses for vCenter for less then that short of reinstalling the thing every 60 days (perma trial). Same with vSphere itself for that matter (with vMotion, storage vMotion and DRS)
 

F1ydave

Member
Mar 9, 2014
137
21
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Please do tell what better bargain you had in mind? I have not seen a way to get legal licenses for vCenter for less then that short of reinstalling the thing every 60 days (perma trial). Same with vSphere itself for that matter (with vMotion, storage vMotion and DRS)
I havent tried vCenter, but you can just keep requesting trial licenses with new emails. You can't just add the new license? Under license features and edit?
 

Entz

Active Member
Apr 25, 2013
269
62
28
Canada Eh?
I havent tried vCenter, but you can just keep requesting trial licenses with new emails. You can't just add the new license? Under license features and edit?
vCenter is awesome :D If your not doing HA or anything then the free non-expiring licenses are fine anyways.

Im sure you could create a new vmware account per server every 60 days but with 2 or 3 hosts that is a PITA. You technically do not need new license keys (They work for 60 days regardless of when applied) but you do need to reinstall vSphere every 60 days (or do the trial reset script thing after removing the host from vCenter) which I would assume is not the intention for a "Trial".
 

mrkrad

Well-Known Member
Oct 13, 2012
1,244
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VMWARE Partner network gives you NFR licenses for all of their products; designed for resellers but low cost!
 

F1ydave

Member
Mar 9, 2014
137
21
18
I am 100% hobbyist. I am a CPA (accountant) by trade :p. Tax filing season is starting to ramp up! I already pay thousands for software, yearly. I'll see how the VMUG goes, I may still purchase the Essentials package for the 2-3 year license. I bought the ebook "Mastering VMware vSphere 5.5" by Scott Lowe. Pretty easy read so far, working my way through it.

I am researching landing pages for a google adsense to link to, on my website right now. Would be nice to get 50+ new clients this year.

My hope it to someday be able to offer offsite backups for clients on the side and Voip services. I have a friend who is working though his Cisco CCNA now. Since I am not in the business, it is a steep learning curve.
 
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Entz

Active Member
Apr 25, 2013
269
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Canada Eh?
I got mine setup. The entitlement for "vSphere with Operations Management Enterprise Plus" is 2 CPUs (socket). Depending on your environment that may or may not be enough. Can anyone else confirm.
 

whitey

Moderator
Jun 30, 2014
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Ewww, that's UGLY, so two phys sockets for the whole mess/ah hem I mean suite of mentioned SW. That doesn't even add up to me as vSAN requires 3 nodes at minimum. Hmmm something is amiss here. Ohh well, not a big deal for me...I am shall we say 'blessed' w/ unfettered Ent Plus VMware lics and I never use them in any unethical cases regardless. All home lab/learning/keep skillset sharp goodies.

EDIT: Ok, I see another thread updated showing they corrected the socket lic count and bumped up to 6. Seems more reasonable. I was abt to start having vRAM licensing nightmares.
 
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T_Minus

Build. Break. Fix. Repeat
Feb 15, 2015
7,625
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You could e-mail and ask them --- they have been really responsive to e-mail Questions I had.

FWIW: had an old updated version of wrkstation I use.
Todd
 

badskater

Automation Architect
May 8, 2013
129
44
28
Canada
Your license key for Horizon should work, for Workstation 11.

Workstation 11 is included as part of the Horizon package.
I think it should work, but better to ask them just to be sure. On some Horizon packages, Workstation is not included. Advanced is usually included (with ThinApp), but make sure. I got my Workstation license with my VCP Certification, so I don't know if it's included in this one.