VMware vCenter Reviews

It's a centralized management service used across the platform. Our clients use it to manage their virtual infrastructure's performance and capacity.

If a customer or business requests a hundred DDI to be provisioned for a hundred users, using the provisioning and deployment automation, we can quickly provision from the existing VM workload based on the predefined configuration. So, within five to ten minutes, you'll be able to provision a hundred DDS for the users.

So, the automation capabilities have improved operations overall.

The clients found the performance monitoring features beneficial. The performance monitoring tools within vCenter help track resource usage, identify performance bottlenecks, and optimize the efficiency of virtual environments.

So, we've been focusing on enhancing the performance monitoring and reporting tools.

vCenter is central to managing multiple VMware vSphere hosts and allows administrators to manage virtual machines from a single centralized console. It provides a unified view of the entire virtualized infrastructure. 

It's crucial for resource management to allocate and manage compute, storage, and networking resources across various hosts and clusters. 

Another significant feature is its high availability options, which help configure and manage settings to ensure continuous operations in the event of hardware failures.

It also supports lifecycle management, aiding in the deployment, migration, and overall management of solutions throughout their lifecycle.

It is like a single point of failure. In an environment, vCenter is deployed as a single instance, which represents a single point of failure. The concern here is that tasks such as provisioning, monitoring, and maintenance may be impacted until the server is restored. This only affects management; users are not impacted. But, again, management capabilities will be impacted. 

The entire system goes down until recovery is completed. You will not be able to provision new VDI. 

Also, vCenter requires a lot of additional resources for managing capabilities. It uses a significant amount of CPU, memory, and network bandwidth, which can sometimes slow down. Proper sizing is important for vCenter so that it does not impact end-users. 

vCentre licensing cost is on the higher side as well. 

We recently started with this solution. 

vCenter is known for its stability and reliability because it operates in a very complex environment, like banks. It is a mature technology that offers return, high availability options, and compatibility integration with all the major hardware and software vendors. 

Also, it has use cases for performance monitoring and optimisation that allows to monitor performance and health of existing environemtn.

There are lots of documents and support available. Moreover, there is a large community of users and experts that contributes to the ecosystem. 

You can scale from a hundred to several thousand servers. It can manage multiple different infrastructures. The system supports a lot of clusters and a group of ESXi host servers, and it can manage them as a single entity. 

It is highly available and has a distributed architecture. vCenter's big distributed architecture allows for scalability and optimization by distributing components across servers. 

The scalability limit depends on the edition and version. But this limit currently includes the platform, VM licenses, and other technical support needs.

It's not straightforward for any deployment, the hardware or implementation models.

Planning hardware and software requirements, installation configuration, input integration with vSphere, backup, and monitoring—all these are involved. Automation, maintenance, and upgrades, for this prior knowledge, are required to deploy vCenter.

It just takes minimal time since the hypervisor is available. It's just a management console. The setup of the tool and configuration and integration with other hypervisors take one week if we have all the prerequisites in place.

It is easy to integrate. This includes integration with customer management and monitoring—all these things can be easily integrated. 

Moreover, good documentation and reporting are available. It's a well-known product.

The deployment resources depend on the number of users. For managing a thousand VMs or a virtual desktop, one engineer is required.

If you require 24/7 support, two engineers, four days for each shift.

For virtual desktop environments, there are different sizing approaches. Sizing can be based on the number of servers or the number of virtual desktops managed.

For example, with a hundred servers, it depends on the support window – 24/7, 16/5, 9/5, etc. We might deploy our own on-site engineers, with a mix of one senior, two mid-level, and two junior staff.

If we size based on the number of virtual desktops, then one resource per shift might support a thousand desktops. To cover 24/7 with two weekly off-days per person, we'd need a minimum of five resources for a thousand desktop operations.

Calculating precise ROI for a real-world website support scenario is complex. It involves comparing costs and benefits of vCenter versus traditional desktop deployments. 

The cost will be on the higher side. However, ROI tends to be higher with vCenter compared to traditional setups. To quantify the benefits, consider these factors:

• Energy Savings: vCenter reduces power consumption compared to physical desktops.
• Scalability and Flexibility: vCenter supports remote work and enables scalability. It operationalize a mobile workforce.
• Security and Compliance: vCenter often offers enhanced security features.
• Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery: Centralization with vCenter improves data recovery and business continuity compared to isolated physical desktops. 

Overall, I would rate the solution a nine out of ten. 

There are two main players in the VDI [Virtual Desktop Infrastructure] solution space: VMware and Citrix. 

Currently, Citrix is a market leader in providing VDI solutions, offering some advantages over VMware. 

However, my recommendation is this: if a customer already uses VMware for virtualization and has a good relationship with VMware, then continuing with VMware for VDI makes sense. It's always best to work with solutions you're familiar with.

As a cloud service provider, we offer infrastructure as a service using VMware components. 

To centrally manage all ESXi servers, we use vCenter. Its features, such as high availability (HA), Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS), and vMotion, make vCenter a unique and valuable product. These features significantly aid my team in delivering superior services to our customers.

As a cloud architect, I'm involved in designing and implementing various solutions, mainly with VMware for virtualization from the computing perspective. 

This includes VMware vCenter, ESXi, VROps, vRealize Automation (vRA), and NSX for networking solutions. My team also works on storage, backup, and security.

I also have experience with VMware vRealize Automation (VRA), which integrates with Center. 

In the past, my team deployed virtual machines for our customers because we couldn't offer a self-service portal or automation solutions. 

With vRealize Automation, we're not only able to automate tasks but also manage vCenter resources efficiently. It allows us to assign resources to customers as needed and provide them with a self-service portal. 

Now, customers can complete tasks independently thanks to automation and workflows in VRA, significantly reducing the need for direct support from my team.

The primary benefit is its user-friendliness. It's not overly complex, allowing new team members to quickly get up to speed. 

Centralized management of ESXi servers and virtual machines is another key advantage, enabling control from a single console. 

This centralized administration, along with vCenter's integration with other VMware products, simplifies the management of our virtual infrastructure.

The integration of vCenter server with any software, whether from VMware or a third party, is smooth and straightforward. We know the required ports and credentials for integration, allowing us to easily integrate vCenter with various products, enhancing our cloud infrastructure.

However, there was a challenge we faced with vCenter, and tried to fix it. Initially, vCenter had its own client console, which was deployed on our laptops to connect to the vCenter server. This client was amazing because it offered a clear view and direct access to vCenter without dependencies. 

However, VMware transitioned from this client software to a web-based console, aiming to eliminate dependencies and make vCenter more accessible. This change introduced challenges, such as the need for patches and browser console errors requiring restarts. 

The web-based interface felt cluttered and complicated compared to the cleaner, more straightforward client interface. This complexity can be overwhelming, especially for those not highly technical. 

This abundance of options on a single screen can be overwhelming, unlike the simplicity of a Google web page where you just type and search.

There is a feature called Fault Tolerance (FT), which has been part of vCenter servers since the product's inception. 

However, it has a lot of complexity, and when my team tested it, we found it difficult to manage. It also has some bugs. Consequently, we decided not to offer any fault tolerance features to our customers. 

So, there are a lot of things that need to be improved in fault tolerance.

I have more than ten years of experience with vCenter and still use it daily. It's a core product for us, something we engage with regularly.

From my experience, vCenter server has rarely been a point of major concern regarding availability. It mainly provides centralized administration, so its unavailability doesn't directly affect the functionality of our cloud infrastructure. 

I've encountered a few instances where vCenter was unavailable or crashed, but the impact was minimal since ESXi servers and the virtual machines on them continued to run smoothly, although features provided by vCenter were temporarily unavailable.

Initially, when vCenter was introduced, scaling it to support a certain number of ESXi hosts and virtual machines was quite challenging. This was around 2012 and 2013. 

However, it has become increasingly scalable over time. Nowadays, we can deploy multiple vCenters in a cluster formation to scale extensively. I haven't reached the maximum capacity of vCenter because it's huge.

I've been working with VMware for about 10 years now.

Earlier, VMware support was very good. The technical guy on the call used to understand the issue from their side. And then, if that issue was beyond their expertise, they generally called other guys or used to forward our call to the next escalation team or something like that. We just used to call them once, and then we got our solution during that one call.

But in the last four to five years, there's been a kind of 360-degree change in terms of customer support from VMware. And most of it's going in the negative direction, which we are not happy with. 

The technician now says, "Okay, this is beyond my expertise. I'm going to escalate it to the next team, and they will be in touch with you in a couple of hours or maybe the next day." And trust me, nobody contacts us until we open another ticket, reference the ticket we opened previously, and ask them to give us priority one support. And again, they start troubleshooting it from scratch. Again, "This is beyond our expertise, and we will forward this call to our next escalation team, and they will get in touch with you." We get stuck in this kind of loop most of the time.

If I'm using ten tickets with VMware, three to nine times it happens when we, you know, keep chasing them for the technical things. Even though they fixed the issue, we ask them to provide a complete justification, the root cause of why this issue occurred, what exactly we did to fix it, and how we can make sure that this issue will not come again in the future. They don't have a clear answer for us. But since things start working for us, most of the time, we don't bother about that. 

But for our reference purpose, we want to keep RCA (Root Cause Analysis) and other documents updated so that we can fix those issues from our side or take any preventive action even before we hit the same situation again. But in the last four or five years, we've been lacking there. Because we're not getting that much good support from VMware, which we used to get back in 2012, 2013, 2014, or so.

Neutral

We have one of the Microsoft Hyper-V solutions.

I've installed it on servers and provided regular support, so I do have experience with the initial setup process. 

Earlier, it was a bit difficult because it required a separate database server installation before installing the central server, and then the database had to be integrated during the vCenter server installation. 

However, this process has been significantly simplified now. vCenter now includes its own database, eliminating the need for separate database installation. We just follow a single setup to deploy vCenter along with its required database, which we are quite pleased with.

The deployment takes approximately 30 minutes to 45 minutes, depending on the infrastructure where it's being deployed, so generally less than an hour.

When I was part of the deployment team, I was the only one responsible for it. Now, we have a dedicated team for installation and deployment, but only one resource is required to deploy the vCenter server.

Assistance from VMware is not really required because the process is very straightforward and simple. 

We just need to follow the instructions provided in the setup wizard, enter the required values, and the installation completes smoothly and straightforwardly.

I have mostly deployed it on-premises and haven't had the opportunity to deploy it in a hybrid environment.

The licensing model was a bit complex, but thanks to the vCenter product usage program, which VMware introduced, it's kind of easy for us to use a pay-as-you-go model. So, it's streamlined now, and we are okay with that.

I would advise that at least you should be very well aware of all the functionalities you are going to offer to your customers. Then, you should see whether those functionalities are there in the vCenter server and working as per the documentation provided by VMware. You should be very well aware of it. 

One example is the fault tolerance problem. Although VMware said it was fine, practically, we haven't seen it working as expected. So features need to be identified in advance before choosing vCenter server.

Overall, I would rate the solution a nine out of ten because I'm very much happy with all the features provided by vCenter.

We use the product to manage the internal infrastructure. We use it in the cement division of a construction company.

VMware vCenter is a well-known tool. The tool is absolutely necessary. It helps manage our server. We have more than 200 servers. It would be very difficult for us if we did not have VMware vCenter. We extensively use automatic Distributed Resource Scheduler and migration tools to move workloads between different servers. The solution has defined virtual infrastructure management. It provides a single pane of glass to manage the infrastructure. We manage practically everything using the solution.

The monitoring features are limited. We need extra features from third-party products. We can do basic management with vCenter. The vendor needs to be more proactive. VMware sells other products to improve its capabilities. However, it would be good if the tool included proactive management to enable users to manage the virtual infrastructure better.

I have been using the solution for 15 years.

I rate the tool’s stability a nine out of ten.

The solution scales well. It is our central point of contact. We need only one vCenter to manage different servers. It’s a good solution. We have four users.

We use the support portal. Sometimes, finding what we need takes time. We can find it after some time, though.

Positive

I rate the ease of setup an eight out of ten. The deployment can be done quickly. The deployment process is very straightforward. The vendor publishes the versions, and they can be deployed without any special knowledge or effort. The deployment takes less than an hour.

The product is affordable for now. With the acquisition of VMware by Broadcom, the policies are changing. It seems like the product will become more expensive. The solution costs us EUR 2000 to EUR 3000 per year.

The main purpose of the tool is managing. Performance must be accomplished by correct sizing and analysis of vCenter hosts. I recommend the tool to others. It is not a luxury. It is a mandatory product. Overall, I rate the product an eight out of ten.

We use the product to manage all the VMware hosts.

The platform provides a single pane of glass to manage all the VMs. It allows us to consolidate multiple systems into one console.

The product’s most valuable feature is 100% availability of the systems and hardware. It proved to be a crucial feature while working in a healthcare environment for ensuring patient safety.

They could improve the product’s dashboard features in terms of providing more realistic information. It could display the status of the storage space in terabytes, the number of VMs, etc. Also, they should provide more alerting capabilities.

They could add NSX features from VSphere for the micro-segmentation of virtual networking in the licensing structure.

We are using the 7.0U3 version of VMware vCenter.

I rate the platform’s stability a ten out of ten.

We can deploy multiple vCenters and links to fault tolerance and high availability. In the scenario where a single vCenter is deployed, if it were to go down, there is a need for a rebuild. However, the rebuilding process is straightforward, especially when configurations are backed up. To enhance resilience, the option to scale out by deploying two or more vCenters and linking them is available.

I rate the platform’s scalability a ten out of ten.

We have used AHV and Hyper-V in the past. However, both of these solutions were inferior to VMware's offering.

The initial setup is straightforward even for complex environments with around 100 hosts. The process is easy for deployment with a smaller number of hosts as well. In case of any issues, the support team provides solutions within a few minutes rather than hours or days.

The product generates a return on investment. The elimination of the need for multiple administrators or engineers handling diverse consoles streamlines operations and significantly reduces labor costs. The consolidated management not only saves time but also eliminates the need for extensive training. VMware is widespread across 90% of the market ensuring the same portion of technical staff availability.

I have worked in two different industries. For the healthcare industry, the price is considerably higher than the education industry. They must even out the pricing across the board as no industry should pay less or more than the other.

We use the product to take snapshots before undertaking updates or upgrades, ensuring a failback mechanism in case of issues. Additionally, when performing maintenance on the physical equipment where VMs reside, vCenter facilitates system transfer to hardware unaffected by the update. It helps with the placement of hosts in maintenance mode, execution of update tasks, and reintegration into the environment. It provides fault tolerance capabilities. We can easily integrate it with Rubrik, a third-party tool.

It is an easy technology to learn. I rate it a ten out of ten.

There are multiple scenarios to consider. One important aspect is the use of snapshots, which are helpful for building anything on Azure. With snapshots, we can capture the state of a virtual machine and revert back to it, using VMware's features. Another valuable feature is vMotion, which allows us to manage and migrate virtual machines from one node to another. This capability is particularly useful for ensuring high availability; if there's an issue with a node, we can seamlessly migrate the virtual machines to another node.

It is easier to manage a larger number of nodes per cluster. Currently, if we are managing a minimum of 64 nodes in a single cluster, that capacity can be increased. Another notable feature is migration, facilitated by VMwareSync. There are minimum memory and CPU requirements, but these can be scaled up along with additional CPU resources for virtual machines, thereby enhancing the available features.

if VMware can introduce multiple other good features, it will further help us work.

I have been using VMware vCenter for ten years.

I rate the solution’s stability a ten out of ten.

Scalability is  impressive. I've worked with clusters comprising 15-16 nodes. VMware vCenter can manage up to 64 nodes in a single cluster, which is a substantial increase.

More than 5,000 users are using this solution.

I rate the solution’s scalability a ten out of ten.

The initial setup is easy and takes an hour to complete. It comes with ready-to-use templates for virtual machines. 

We will download the OEM template from the vCenter side, and then deploy it on the server wherever we need it.

I rate the initial setup a nine out of ten, where one is difficult, and ten is easy.

The product is cheap. It is a one time purchase.

I rate the product’s pricing a out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.

The GUI interface for the monitoring tool is good. We have VMware security features integrated, which is beneficial. Data encryption and robust infrastructure are additional advantages.

One feature is DRS which manages virtual machines. Thus, it migrates virtual machines, adjusting the resources in the background.

Overall, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

You use vCenter in data center operations as the core of your investment infrastructure, coordinating products like NSX, HSL, HSAX, and Cyber Recovery Manager.

Some of the most valuable features of vCenter are LACP and vSphere Distributed Switches, as they simplify VLAN propagation between hosts and enable networking duplication and replication, particularly beneficial in hyper-converged network environments.

Areas for improvement with vCenter include changes in licensing models, such as the shift to a subscription model, which may increase costs and lead to conflicts.

I have been using VMware vCenter for ten years.

I would rate the stability of vCenter as almost a perfect ten out of ten.

I would rate the scalability of vCenter as a ten out of ten.

The main differences between Azure and VMware include the level of control and integration. VMware offers a comprehensive server and virtualization solution with extensive control, while Azure provides integration with other Microsoft services but may lack complete control over networking and troubleshooting processes.

The initial setup of vCenter is now straightforward, especially with the virtual appliance. Typically, one person can handle deployment and configuration, and maintenance is rarely required due to the product's stability.

With the subscription model, pricing for vCenter may be higher compared to the previous perpetual license model. The subscription model requires ongoing payments, and if you stop paying, you may lose access to updates and support.

vCenter has significantly simplified VM deployment and management processes, making tasks easier and more efficient. Its centralized features are highly valued, especially when compared to other solutions like Microsoft's System Center Virtual Machine Manager, which lacks certain functionalities.

The scalability feature of vCenter has supported our growth by providing flexibility and efficiency. As an expert, I have found it invaluable in resolving issues and managing growth, especially during transitions to cloud-based infrastructures like Azure, which have reduced the need for extensive on-premises resources.

Our experience with vCenter backup and recovery functionalities involved integration issues with our existing tool. Currently, we use Commvault for backup, which is straightforward to configure but lacks full integration capabilities.

I would recommend VMware vCenter to others because it is a stable and reliable product. However, new users should consider the costs associated with the subscription model.

Overall, I would rate VMware vCenter as a ten out of ten.

We don't use VMware vCenter daily. It's installed and runs our servers, which we use daily but don't actively interact with it.

VMware vCenter has significantly improved our infrastructure management by enabling virtualization. We can virtualize our infrastructure, eliminating the need to access servers physically. Everything can be managed remotely.

The tool's most valuable feature is virtualization. It has positively impacted our operational efficiency by offering remote management capabilities through a user-friendly web interface. Its ease of use, as it doesn't require qualified personnel to operate, was a factor in our decision to purchase it.

One area where VMware vCenter has room for improvement is its transition to Broadcom. The change in licensing structure and pricing, particularly the shift from perpetual licenses to subscription-only models, is a significant drawback.

I have been using the product since 2016.  

I would rate the VMware vCenter's stability as an eight out of ten. It's very stable, but after a long period, it started generating a lot of log files, which caused some server issues.

In our organization, only one administrator, myself, manages and uses VMware vCenter. No other users access the vCenter management console.

I haven't contacted technical support yet. 

The tool's deployment is very easy. Our deployment of VMware vCenter took approximately two to three weeks. Due to the software's large size, it couldn't be completed in just a few hours or days.

We deployed the product in-house. Two resources were needed to complete it. 

The tool used to be worth the money, but after Broadcom acquired it and changed the pricing structure to subscription-only, it became too expensive for us to continue using. Unfortunately, we haven't found any alternative solutions that meet our needs, so this is a significant drawback for us as we explore other options.

I wouldn't recommend VMware vCenter to others, especially since Broadcom acquired it. I rate the overall product an eight out of ten. 

Our primary use case for VMware is in our IT environment, specifically within our data center for our Enterprise Application Testing (EAT) server.

The product has improved our system's proactive support for in-built AI tools. It automatically identifies potential issues and helps customers with feedback.

The product's most valuable feature is the ability to clone and snapshot the process for POC.

vCenter's demo functionality needs enhancement. One notable area for enhancement revolves around cost considerations, as introducing features such as DDoS protection or data compression could reduce expenses. We have an infrastructure comprising around 200 VMs that require approximately 20 terabytes of storage for efficient data management. The deduplication and compression features help organizations manage large numbers of servers, streamline operations, reduce storage requirements, and navigate capacity upgrades more seamlessly.

Nowadays, all the products have cloud functionality. Thus, they could introduce a hybrid cloud system and a unified licensing model. We have to buy several SLM licenses for different components, including a demo. Instead, they could include all functionalities in one license.

We have been using VMware vCenter since 2010.

I rate the platform's stability an eight out of ten. Whenever we encounter any technical issues, the support team resolves them.

VMware vCenter is suitable for medium enterprises. We use the product for user acceptance testing and for providing cyber security for product and test environments. Thus, we are using a substantial number of 18 servers in our business infrastructure.

However, Nutanix is more scalable than VMware. We can host as many clusters as required using it.

The initial setup is simple. However, Nutanix has a simpler process.

The platform is highly-priced. It is suitable for medium enterprises. We use the product for user acceptance testing and for providing cyber security for product and test environments. Thus, we are using a substantial number of eighteen servers in our business infrastructure.

However, Nutanix is more scalable than VMware. We can host as many clusters as required using it.

We have evaluated Microsoft Hyper V, Nutanix, and other vendors along with VMware vCenter. Among them, Nutanix is more preferable.

VMware vCenter provides excellent flexibility in terms of managing virtual infrastructure. We can provision services anytime. We can easily create a distribution suite and manage networks. I rate the platform's efficiency for multicluster operations an eight out of ten.

I rate the overall product an eight out of ten.