ESXi 4.0

I recently realized I needed to update my skills from VMWare ESX 3.x to version 4.x.  So I recently converted one of my home lab machines from Windows Server to ESXi.  VMware is making its standalone ESXi hypervisor available at no cost in order to help companies of all sizes experience the benefits of virtualization.

VMware ESX and VMware ESXi are both bare-metal hypervisors that install directly on the server hardware. The difference resides in the architecture and the operational management of VMware ESXi. Although neither hypervisor relies on an OS for resource management, VMware ESX relies on a Linux operating system, called the service console, to perform two management functions: executing scripts and installing third party agents for hardware monitoring, backup or systems management. The service console has been removed from ESXi, drastically reducing the hypervisor footprint and completing the ongoing trend of migrating management functionality from the local command line interface to remote management tools. The smaller code base of ESXi represents a smaller “attack surface” and less code to patch, improving reliability and security.  From a security professional’s standpoint this appeals to me. The functionally of the service console is replaced by remote command line interfaces and management with the vSphere client.

While the official VMWare Hardware Compatibility List (HCL) does not list my test machine the install of ESXi 4 went very quickly and appears to be working fine.  The only requirement is a 64-bit capable processor, this machine does not have the Intel Virtualization extensions.

While I can’t get most of the advantages of shared SAN storage the 500 GB hard drive in this machine is more than enough space to run the permanent virtual machines I need as well as space to stand up specific environments to test or learn most scenarios.  This will also be the platform to learn Server 2008.

After registering with VMWare and downloading the code, the install took about 10 minutes:

1. In the BIOS disable “cpu id is limited” or set to set support to legacy /nt4
2. Boot the CD created from the downloaded ISO
3. Allow the installer to partition the drive as it wishes
4. Reboot when completed
5. A small management console will appear allowing you to set the IP address, root password etc
6. Install the vSphere client on another machine

I was up and running in no time.  While not a server class machine this will be more than sufficient for the experimentation and learning I need to do.  So far I am very impressed with this version of ESX and look forward to more experimentation.