Specifications

vSphere 5.0 Essentials and Essentials Plus Kits
If you have vSphere 5.0 Essentials or Essential Plus kits, you cannot use more than 192GB of vRAM for powered-
on virtual machines. If the memory that is configured to powered-on virtual machines reaches 192GB, you
cannot power on any new virtual machines or hot add memory to already powered-on virtual machines.
Extending a vRAM Pool
If the amount of vRAM that is available in the vRAM pools in your virtual environment is insufficient, you
can extend the vRAM pools to keep them in compliance with the licensing model of vSphere 5.0 products.
You can extend a vRAM pool of a certain license edition in three ways.
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Assign new license keys of the same edition to unlicensed ESXi 5.0 hosts. To increase the vRAM pool for
vSphere Standard, you can assign another license key of vSphere Standard to an unlicensed ESXi 5.0 host.
In this case, the key adds its vRAM capacity to the vRAM pool for vSphere Standard.
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Assign a license key of the same edition and a larger processor capacity to ESXi 5.0 hosts. You can use the
VMware License Portal to create a license key with a larger processor capacity by combining the capacities
of an already assigned license key and a new key. You can combine the capacities of only license keys that
are of the same vSphere 5.0 edition. To extend the vRAM pool for the corresponding license edition, you
can remove the old license key from the ESXi 5.x hosts and license them with the key that you created by
using the License Portal. For example, suppose that you license a group of ESXi 5.0 hosts with license key
A of vSphere Standard. License key A has a capacity of 10 processors and adds 320GB of vRAM to the
pool for vSphere Standard. The 365-day moving average for the vRAM usage reaches 320GB. You purchase
license key B of vSphere Standard that has a capacity of 5 processors corresponding to a vRAM entitlement
of 160GB. You use the VMware Licensing Portal to combine the capacities of license key A and B to create
license key C of vSphere Standard that has a capacity of 15 processors. You remove license key A from
the ESXi 5.0 hosts and assign them the new license key C. Respectively, the vRAM pool for vSphere
Standard is extended to 480GB.
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Upgrade the editions of the license keys that are assigned to ESXi 5.0 hosts. For example, you can upgrade
the license keys from vSphere Standard to vSphere Enterprise. License keys of vSphere Enterprise entitle
64GB of vRAM.
Licensing for vCenter Server 5.0
vCenter Server 5.0 systems are licensed with vCenter Server 5.0 license keys that have per-instance capacity.
To license a single vCenter Server 5.0, you need a vCenter Server 5.0 license key with a capacity for one instance.
If you have vCenter Server systems in a Linked Mode group, you can purchase a vCenter Server license key
with a larger capacity and assign the key to all vCenter Server systems in the group.
NOTE If you license vCenter Server 5.0 with vCenter Server Standard or Foundation licenses, vCenter Server
restricts managing hosts that are licensed with vSphere Essentials or Essentials Plus license keys.
Solution Licensing
Solutions can have different licensing models depending on the specifics of every solution.
Every solution that integrates its license management in vCenter Server is licensed on a different basis. Some
solutions can be licensed on per-instance basis, others can be licensed on per-virtual machine basis. For
example, vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.0 is licensed on per-virtual machine basis. A license key for Site
Recovery Manager 5.0 defines the number of virtual machines that you can protect.
For information about the licensing model of a certain solution, see the documentation for that solution.
vCenter Server and Host Management
72 VMware, Inc.