vSphere and vSAN now have more flexibility in ROBO use cases.
Last week, vSphere 6.7 Update 2 was announced.
ROBO Licensing Considerations
Remember that vSAN licensing is separate from vSphere licensing.
When deciding which licensing option to use for Remote Office/Branch Office locations several items must be considered:
- Number of virtual machines
- Number of sites
- Features needed
When vSAN ROBO editions initially aligned with the available vSphere ROBO editions. There were only Standard and Advanced editions.
With the release of vSphere 6.5 Update 1 (vSAN 6.6.1) we also added a vSAN Enterprise for ROBO licensing option.
vSAN ROBO licenses can be used with any valid vSphere license.
Customers that wanted to use the added benefit of Distributed Resource Scheduling (DRS) would often combine a vSAN ROBO license with vSphere Enterprise+ license.
DRS for Maintenance Mode
With the introduction of vSphere 6.7 Update 2, the vSphere Enterprise for ROBO license has been added. Customers can now benefit from some of the DRS features when using vSphere Enterprise for ROBO, which is especially beneficial when performing maintenance/lifecycle management of vSAN clusters.
(Click to see the process)
Data at Rest Encryption Choice
Additionally, we’ve always emphasized that VMware provides Data at Rest Encryption choice with VM Encryption and vSAN Encryption.
Data at Rest Encryption with ROBO licensing only had the option of vSAN Encryption. VM Encryption is now available when using vSphere Enterprise ROBO.
If you’re not sure which Data at Rest Encryption strategy is the right choice for your ROBO use case, be sure to check out the VM & vSAN Encryption FAQ – https://vmware.com/go/encryptionfaq
More Flexible
ROBO Editions of vSphere and vSAN have always been great together. The latest update to vSphere with 6.7 Update 2, and the addition of vSphere Enterprise ROBO, makes it easier to pick and choose which combination is the best fit for our customers.
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