VMware vSphere 8 Update 2 Released (IA)
VMware has released ESXi 8 Update 2, vCenter 8 Update 2, vSAN 8 Update 2 and vSphere with Tanzu 8 “Update 2”.
NOTE: Before upgrading, remember to check if your third support vSphere 8 Update 2, like backup/monitoring/automation/integration software/services.
NOTE: On October 18th the release was changed to GA.
ESXi 8 Update 2
What’s new:
- support for NVIDIA BlueField-2 DPUs to server designs from Fujitsu (Intel Sapphire Rapids).
- added support for quick boot on more server models
- In-Band Error-Correcting Code (IB ECC) support
- Support for Graphics and AI/ML workloads on Intel ATS-M
- Enhanced ESXi CPU Scheduler
- Multiple driver update
- IPv6 driver enhancements
- Uniform Passthrough (UPT) mode support in the nvmxnet3 driver
- CIM Services Tickets for REST Authentication:
- Virtual hardware version 21 (more bigger better)
- Hot-extend a shared vSphere Virtual Volumes Disk
- Increase max passthrough Virtual Functions (VFs) per VM to 128
- Use vNVME controller for WSFC
- USB 3.2 Support in virtual eXtensible Host Controller Interface (xHCI)
- Read-only mode for attached virtual disks
- Support VM clone when a First Class Disk (FCD) is attached
- GPU Driver VM for any passthrough GPU card
- Support for multiple TCP connections on a single NFS v3 volume
- SXCLI support for SCSI UNMAP operations for vSphere Virtual Volumes
- And more
See the release notes here.
vCenter 8 Update 2
What’s new:
- Reduce upgrade downtime for a self-managed vCenter:
- Automatic pre-update Logical Volume Manager (LVM) snapshots for quick and reliable rollback
- Detailed information about File lock owners and processes in vCenter
- API for vSphere plug-ins to classify vCenter events
- Keep network configuration changes after a vCenter backup:
- Non-disruptive SSL certificate renewal and replacement for vCenter
- vCenter support for identity federation with Microsoft Entra Active Directory (former Azure AD)
- Activate retreat mode for vSphere Cluster Services (vCLS) from the vSphere Client
- GPU:
- Reduced fragmentation of vSphere DRS placement for GPUs
- vMotion stun time limit for vGPU virtual machine
- Storage:
- Migration of persistent container volumes between datastores in the vSphere Cloud Native Storage
- Storage Policy Based Management (SPBM) Support for Asynchronous CNS Queries
- Container Storage Interface (CSI) snapshot support for Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service
- Offline consolidation improvement with VMFS SE Sparse
- Extend online shared disks in clustered applications with vSphere Virtual Volumes
- Support for NVMe in-band migration
- Support for third-party Multipathing Plug‐In (MPP) for vSphere Virtual Volumes
- Directory Name Lookup Cache (DNLC) for NFS 4.1
- vLCM
- Support for vSAN witness node desired state image independent of a vSAN cluster
- vSphere Configuration Profiles Drafts
See the release notes here.
vSAN 8 Update 2
This update introdues a new storage offering called vSAN MAX that provides Petabyte-scale disaggregated storage for vSphere clusters, powered by vSAN ESA.
What’s new:
- Performance without Tradeoffs
- vSAN Express Storage Architecture (vSAN ESA)
- Increased write buffer (vSAN OSA)
- Native snapshots with minimal performance impact (vSAN ESA)
- Supreme Resource and Space Efficiency
- Erasure Coding without compromising performance
- Improved compression
- Expanded usable storage potential
- Reduced performance overhead for high VM consolidation
- HCI Mesh support for 10 client clusters
- Fast, Efficient Data Protection with vSAN ESA Native Snapshots
- Negligible performance impact
- Faster snapshot operations
- Consistent partner backup application experience using VMware VADP
- Availability and Serviceability
- Simplified and accelerated servicing per devic
- Smaller failure domains and reduced data resynchronization
- Enhanced data availability and improved SLAs
- vSAN boot-time optimizations
- Enhanced shutdown and startup workflows
- Reduced vSAN File Service failover time
- Intuitive, Agile Operations
- Consistent interfaces across all vSAN platforms
- Per-VM policies increase flexibility
- Proactive Insight into compatibility and compliance
- Additional Features and Enhancements
- Enhanced network uplink latency metrics
- RDT level checksums
- vSAN File Service debugging
- vSAN File Service over IPv6
- vSAN File Service network reconfiguration
- vSphere Client Remote Plug-ins
- vLCM HCL disk device
- Reduced start time of vSAN health service
- vSAN health check provides perspective to VCF LCM
- vSAN improves cluster NDU for VMC
- vSAN encryption key verification
- Better handling of large component deletes
- Renamed vSAN health “Check” to “Finding.”
- Place vSAN in separate sandbox domain
- vSAN Proactive Insights
- Management and monitoring of PMEM for SAP HANA
- Replace MD5, SHA1, and SHA2 in vSAN
- L6 compliance
See the release notes here.
vSphere with Tanzu 8 “Update 2”
What’s new:
- Supervisor
- VM Service now supports VMs with Windows OS, GPUs, and all other options available for traditional vSphere VMs
- VM Image Service
- Import and export the Supervisor configuration
- Improved GPU utilization by reducing fragmentation
- Supervisor supports Kubernetes 1.26
- Support of NSX Advanced Load Balancer for a Supervisor configured with NSX networking
- Telegraf Support for Metric and Event Streaming
- Tanzu Kubernetes Grid on Supervisor
- STIG compliance for TKRs on vSphere 8.0
- Turn on control plane rollout for expiring certificates
- CSI snapshot support for TKRs
- Installing and Managing Tanzu Packages
- Custom ClusterClass improvements
- Rolling Updates for TKG clusters
See the release notes here.