Vmware 7.0 Support End Of Life

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Curtis Boykins

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Aug 3, 2024, 3:56:56 PM8/3/24

to dieconmike

VMware typically support ESXi for a duration of 7 years with 5 years of general support and anadditional 2 years of technical guidance during which ESXi will no longer receive bug fixes andsecurity updates. Additional information on lifecycle phases can be found at -infrastructure.html.

The last date on which you can request support; the end of regular VMware maintenance updates andupgrades, bug and security fixes, and technical assistance as per the Support and SubscriptionTerms and Conditions.

The last date on which you can access support and workarounds for low-severity issues on supportedconfigurations only. During the Technical Guidance phase, VMware does not offer new hardwaresupport, server/client/guest OS updates, new security patches or bug fixes unless otherwise noted.

When your operating system reaches its VMware EOSL dates, you have two primary options: you can opt for a costly OS upgrade, or you can explore IT infrastructure managed services that your OS creator may not offer for your particular version. We offer VMware EOL and EOSL support for popular variants like vSAN, vSphere, ESXi, vCenter, Horizon, and Horizon DaaS. Contact our team today for VMware end of life support on your OS!

We recently upgraded to Vmware Esxi 6.5 for our hosts which host a bunch of VM's that I backup. Before that we were on Esxi 5.5. Prior to the upgrade the vm backup was running without any issues, however post upgrade none of them seem to be working and fail with the message "error opening snapshot disks using given transport mode status 23". I have tried using different transport modes but no luck. Updated the host file entries on my master server to point to the correct Esxi host, still no luck.

What I wanted to check was before going any further is that ... Is Netbaclup version 7.6 compatible with backing up virtiual machines on host with the version of 6.5? I know this version of netbackup is really old and end of support life, but I wanted to know if there some kind of matrix from Veritas which says .. using this version of netbackup (7.6).. you wont be able to backup vm's on Esxi version 6.5...

During the General Support phase, VMware offers maintenance updates and upgrades, bug and security fixes, and technical support to customers who have purchased VMware support. Every major release will receive at least 3 update releases. These updates contain bug fixes, new entablements, and new features but they do not extend the support lifecycle. Patch releases for critical bugs or vulnerabilities are issued for specific major or update releases. Before they can be applied, you will need to make sure your ESXi installation has been updated to the corresponding update release. In the General Support phase, VMware also offers new hardware support. This means that VMware will work with its hardware partners to continuously update the VMware Compatibility Guide with new hardware platforms for that particular release.

During the 2 years of Technical Guidance, the support services offered are reduced. VMware no longer offers new hardware support, server/client/guest OS updates, security patches, or bug fixes, and customers are encouraged to use the self-help portal. It is still possible to open a support request for low-severity issues on supported configurations only. For these reasons, this phase is intended for customers operating in stable environments with systems that are operating under reasonably stable loads. An ESXi version reaches its End of Support Life (EOSL) at the end of this Technical Guidance phase.

ESXi 6.5 and 6.7 will be going end of General Support on October 15, 2022. Their Technical Guidance phase will run until November 15, 2023. However, VMware is offering 2 years of extended support for ESXi 6.5 and 6.7, which would mean you can claim support until October 15, 2024. In order to get continuous support, you have to buy the extended support before the end of General Support. This extended support does not include updates for 3rd party Software packages. There will be no architectural, performance improvements, or feature additions. Security patches are limited to one roll-up per year.

With the upcoming End of General Support for ESXi 6.5 and 6.7, our data team at Lansweeper decided to have a look at the current situation of ESXi installs in their data set. The snapshot found over 79,000 ESXi Servers installed across over 6,000 organizations. Of these installations, 36.49% are of ESXi 6.7 and 21.30% are ESXi 6.5. This means that on October 15th, a total of 57.79% of currently used ESXi Servers will be going end of life. Moreover, the data revealed that 15.81% percent of installations are already using a version of ESXi that has been EOL for quite some time. All in all, this means that come October 15th, only 26.4% of ESXi installations will still be supported (7.0 or newer).

With some versions of VMware vSphere ESXi having reached or soon to reach their end of life, we prepared some frequently asked questions (FAQs) about what that may mean for your workplace and why you should care.

Lifecycle management is vital to the ongoing supportability, performance and availability of any business-critical IT system. Any software end of life is a good reminder to take a fresh look at your virtualization infrastructure. Doing so can help your organization identify opportunities to better its IT environment, including:

End of Support Life (EOSL) occurs when a product is no longer supported by its manufacturer. End of support life for VMware is classified as either end of general support or end of technical guidance.

Your business may be at risk because VMware is under no obligation to provide product patches and updates. Security updates and bug fixes will no longer be supported. In addition, you may be missing out on new features, and there are other advantages to assessing your environment and selecting a modern approach to virtualization.

We recommend you first assess your IT environment to make sure the upgrade you choose is a good fit for your infrastructure. If you need help with the assessment, contact an expert at Loffler. We can provide a VMware Health Check Assessment, which includes:

Randy is a CISSP who leads the Cybersecurity and IT Consulting team at Loffler Companies. He is focused on applying his 25+ years of IT experience to help his clients measure, understand and manage information security risk through the vCISO managed consulting program.

So, after doing some reading, I see that the new vSphere LifeCycle manager is only supported by HPE Ilo Amplifier. Seeing as we run Oneview for all our remote support, and general firmware patching for our servers, will there be a newer Oneview which will support lifecycle manager, or will we have to deploy out yet another appliance and run Ilo Amplifier AND Oneview together to use the full lifecycle manager funtionality?

The VMware Infrastructure 3 Support Life Cycle Policy, and especially the End of Support Matrix that you can see a summary table below (full table available at VMware.com) covers the software suites VMware Infrastructure 3 Starter, Standard and Enterprise Editions and includes the following products:

1. These dates do not apply to each individual maintenance (x.y.z) release or update. They apply to minor release level (x.y) only. For details on the maintenance release support lifecycle within a minor release, click on the appropriate minor release version number above.
2. Formerly known as VMware ESX Server.
3. Formerly known as VMware ESX Server 3i

The releases of the NVIDIA vGPU Manager and guest VM drivers that you install must be compatible. If you install an incompatible guest VM driver release for the release of the vGPU Manager that you are using, the NVIDIA vGPU fails to load.
See VM running an incompatible NVIDIA vGPU guest driver fails to initialize vGPU when booted.

You must use NVIDIA License System with every release in this release family of NVIDIA vGPU software. The legacy NVIDIA vGPU software license server has reached end of life (EOL) and is no longer supported.

When NVIDIA vGPU Manager is used with guest VM drivers from a different release within the same branch or from the previous branch, the combination supports only the features, hardware, and software (including guest OSes) that are supported on both releases.

For example, if vGPU Manager from release 13.12 is used with guest drivers from release 11.2, the combination does not support Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.6 because NVIDIA vGPU software release 13.12 does not support Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.6.

This release family of NVIDIA vGPU software provides support for several NVIDIA GPUs on validated server hardware platforms, VMware vSphere hypervisor software versions, and guest operating systems. It also supports the version of NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit that is compatible with R470 drivers.

This release of NVIDIA vGPU software on VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) provides support for several NVIDIA GPUs running on validated server hardware platforms. For a list of validated server platforms, refer to NVIDIA Virtual GPU Certified Servers.

The GPUs listed in the following table support multiple display modes. As shown in the table, some GPUs are supplied from the factory in displayless mode, but other GPUs are supplied in a display-enabled mode.

To change the mode of a GPU that supports multiple display modes, use the displaymodeselector tool, which you can request from the NVIDIA Display Mode Selector Tool page on the NVIDIA Developer website.

To configure the mode of Tesla M60 and M6 GPUs, use the gpumodeswitch tool provided with NVIDIA vGPU software releases. If you are unsure which mode your GPU is in, use the gpumodeswitch tool to find out the mode.

Only Tesla M60 and M6 GPUs support the gpumodeswitch tool. Other GPUs that support NVIDIA vGPU do not support the gpumodeswitch tool and, except as stated in Switching the Mode of a GPU that Supports Multiple Display Modes, do not require mode switching.