VMware announces vSphere 6.5 at VMworld Europe
Today, VMware announced vSphere 6.5 at VMworld Europe in Barcelona. This new version builds on the foundation of previous vSphere versions and contains some big enhancements to core vSphere features.
HTML5-based vSphere Client
Perhaps one of the most anticipated features is the new HTML5-based vSphere Client. This new client was previously released as a VMware Labs fling and now it is integrated in vSphere 6.5. The client is fast, responsive and has a modern look and feel. The new client also works without any external plugins. It is a native HTML5 client.
vCenter Server Appliance
The Windows version of VMware vCenter Server was deprecated in previous versions of vSphere and vSphere 6.5 only provides the vCenter Server Appliance (VCSA). The VCSA is easy to deploy and manage an now contains a fully integrated vSphere Update Manager, a file-based backup and recovery and native VCSA high availability. This makes the VCSA the ideal building block for vSphere environments. And best of all, the migration from vCenter Server for Windows to the VCSA is fully supported through the vCenter Server Appliance Migration tool.
Security enhancements
vSphere 6.5 delivers security enhancements in three major areas: secure data, secure infrastructure and secure access. vSphere 6.5 has VM-level disk encryption. This means vSphere can encrypt any VM disk regardless of guest OS. Adding Encrypted vMotion, vSphere can now safeguard both data at-rest and data in-motion. Finally, audit-quality logging provides more forensic information about user actions.
Universal Platform
vSphere 6.5 is targeted as a universal platform for all workloads. vSphere was already great in running traditional workloads and now VMware is integrating vSphere Integrated Containers (VIC) to make it a unified platform for next generation applications. VIC simply exposes the container APIs to the developers and the VMware admins can manage the environment as they were used to. Best of both worlds. vSphere 6.5 is also the foundation for VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Cloud on AWS. Both services are built on vSphere 6.5 and it is truly a unified platform for ANY workload.
Lots of detailed specifics on vSphere 6.5 are provided by VMware:
http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2016/10/whats-new-in-vsphere-6-5-vcenter-server.html
http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2016/10/whats-new-in-vsphere-6-5-security.html
http://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2016/10/whats-new-in-vsphere-6-5-host-resource-management-and-operations.html
