New to UCS... Windows or VSphere?? any advice...

[Luis Yrigoyen]

We recently purchased 2 C210 M2 servers (with LSI RAID controllers) and we're starting to configure them.  We received licenses for VSphere ESXi 4.X but I'm having some problems downloading the ISOs and I'm losing my patience with their support team (they really suck!!!)...

anyway, I have Windows server 2008 R2 readily available Im I don't know if to install Windows or VSphere.

Does anybody have any advice?  Has anybody worked with both?

I'm planning on virtualizing (if supported) systems like UCM, Unity Conn, CUIC, UCCE PG.

thanks

[padramas]

Hello Luis,

Both Windows 2008 and ESXi are supported on C210 rack servers.

Since you are planning to virtualize Cisco UC apps, ESXi is the only supported hypervisor.

The following link provides detailed information on UC on UCS requirements

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Unified_Communications_VMware_Requirements

And for HW / FW / OS compatibility, verify the HCL matrix here

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps10477/prod_technical_reference_list.html

HTH

Padma

[Luis Yrigoyen]

padramas,

     Thank you very much for the links, I'll get started on those.

do you know if:

Can both Windows and Vsphere be installed in the same server?

Can Windows images be hosted on a VSphere server?

thanks

[padramas]

Hello Luis,

Yes, the hardware supports both Windows and vSphere.But to be clear, we can have only one of them installed on the hardware at a time.

Once you have installed ESX / ESXi on the server, you can run Windows or other OS as virtual machines depending upon your business requirements.

As you have mentioned UC apps earlier, please check the docwiki on supported deployments ( i.e which VMs can co-reside on same physical server )

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Unified_Communications_Virtualization_Sizing_Guidelines

Padma