ESXi Evaluation Period
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So this is a bit of a bash on ESXi, but more a question on why a business would take a full 180 days before realizing that "Oh hey we need to buy this". Or downgrade to the 100% free ESXi version, and lose functionality.
This person here setup a production system on the evaluation version of ESXi, lost power, and is now unable to start his VM's.
Obviously he has a few choices
- Buy a license from VMware
- Register for a free key and continue on this path (how long can this really last)
- Convert to a different Hypervisor
I'm curious as to how could one be so dense as to have to ask what they should do. Can someone help me to understand the mindset that this person was going through setting up this system?
Please.
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@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
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@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
That is what I was thinking as well.
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@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
Love that term... Sales minion
Aside from that... Newbee, low on budget, no experience, who knows. I'm getting a bit tired of telling people about free HV and XS
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Oddly enough, 4 out of 5 answers from ML users... OK, @Garyw has not been seen here on ML for about 5 months, but anyway.
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@thwr said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
Love that term... Sales minion
Aside from that... Newbee, low on budget, no experience, who knows. I'm getting a bit tired of telling people about free HV and XS
After a while you'll have a number of responses for these same situations documented so you can just copy/paste em in, that is assuming apathy doesn't sap you of all action.
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@thwr said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
Love that term... Sales minion
Aside from that... Newbee, low on budget, no experience, who knows. I'm getting a bit tired of telling people about free HV and XS
I just had the minion movie on in the background this weekend. I'm afraid that I'm insulting Minions with that phrase, but it's just so apropos.
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@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@thwr said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@travisdh1 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@DustinB3403 Basically, no real world experience at all. Doesn't realize the evaluation license isn't the same thing as the free license (or a sales minion said it was the same thing and were taken at face value.)
Love that term... Sales minion
Aside from that... Newbee, low on budget, no experience, who knows. I'm getting a bit tired of telling people about free HV and XS
I just had the minion movie on in the background this weekend. I'm afraid that I'm insulting Minions with that phrase, but it's just so apropos.
I tend to call them marketing slaves, sales cutthroats or something like that
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@DustinB3403 said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
I'm curious as to how could one be so dense as to have to ask what they should do. Can someone help me to understand the mindset that this person was going through setting up this system?
I don't think they have to be particularly dense. I don't think the licencing around ESXi is particularly clear. I mean it's not rocket science, but it's not spelled out either. Kind of understandable, I guess, as VMWare don't want to make it too easy for people to use the free version.
In my experience, most evaluation software reverts automatically to the free version when the evaluation period expires. ESXi is slightly unusual in that you have to obtain and install a licence to use the free version. But only slightly unusual, I'm not trying to defend the guy particularly.
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@Carnival-Boy said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
I don't think they have to be particularly dense. I don't think the licencing around ESXi is particularly clear. I mean it's not rocket science, but it's not spelled out either. Kind of understandable, I guess, as VMWare don't want to make it too easy for people to use the free version.
Except the name "trial license" kind of gives it all away. Maybe not the details, maybe not the time frame.... but the name alone tells you it's non-viable and not an option. Unless he poured over the actual details and got them wrong, it means he didn't even check the name of the license. If we were talking about the complexities of Essentials or Essentials Plus I might agree that he just didn't do his homework.
But honestly, if he can't figure out the "trial license" is a trial, he must know enough that he can't be in any situation where he has to make decisions.
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@Carnival-Boy said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
In my experience, most evaluation software reverts automatically to the free version when the evaluation period expires. ESXi is slightly unusual in that you have to obtain and install a licence to use the free version. But only slightly unusual, I'm not trying to defend the guy particularly.
Not in the Windows world, for example. This definitely happens a bit, but I'd say that it is far from the norm. Especially for enterprise software where I've never seen that happen at all.
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Why has no one linked him the article on if SMB is viable in the SMB market?
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@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
Why has no one linked him the article on if SMB is viable in the SMB market?
Got a link?
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that's a good one to keep handy. If you ever need it, do a topic title search for SMB. It's like on page 2.
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@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
that's a good one to keep handy. If you ever need it, do a topic title search for SMB. It's like on page 2.
It just went in my pastbin, I need to rename it "SWJ is to prolific".
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@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
Except the name "trial license" kind of gives it all away. Maybe not the details, maybe not the time frame.... but the name alone tells you it's non-viable and not an option.
I'm not aware that ESXi uses the term "trial licence"? It has "Evaluation Mode" which doesn't have a licence key.
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@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
Not in the Windows world, for example. This definitely happens a bit, but I'd say that it is far from the norm. Especially for enterprise software where I've never seen that happen at all.
Dunno. Give me some examples of other free software that requires a licence key to be installed?
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@Carnival-Boy said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:
Except the name "trial license" kind of gives it all away. Maybe not the details, maybe not the time frame.... but the name alone tells you it's non-viable and not an option.
I'm not aware that ESXi uses the term "trial licence"? It has "Evaluation Mode" which doesn't have a licence key.
Ah sorry, I know that it was something that gave away all necessary information in the name, though. Putting something into evaluation mode rather than installing for production, to me, 100% puts all onus on whoever agreed to that. They just ignored the need for their licensing and that they needed to be aware of that before using the evaluation was stated in the name. I just don't see any wiggle room for the OP to make excuses in this case (or for us to excuse him.)
In fact, with a name like evaluation mode, if he wasn't totally clear on all of the licensing details he should not have been running it for prod workloads even temporarily as that name implies that ANY production usage is not allowed, temporary, evaluation or otherwise (evaluation only implies that you can evaluate somehow, no suggestion of production.)
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I posted that link for that ESXi SMB topic.
