All about vSphere 5.1

vSphere 5.1 Download & Documentation Links

vSphere Licensed Downloads (valid download account required).

ESXi 5.1.0 Installable

vCenter Server 5.1.0 and modules

VMware vCloud Director 5.1.0

VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.1.0

VMware vCenter Infrastructure Navigator 1.2.0

VMware vCenter Operations Management 5.0.3

VMware vCenter Configuration Manager 5.5.1

vSphere Data Protection 5.1.0 

vSphere Replication 5.1.0

vSphere Storage Appliance 5.1.0 

vCloud Networking and Security 5.1.0

vCenter Orchestrator Appliance 5.1.0

vSphere Free Downloads

HP Custom Image for ESXi 5.1.0

ESXi™ 5.1 Reference Poster

vSphere PowerCLI 5.1

vSphere CLI 5.1

vSphere Management Assistant 5.1

Release Notes

VMware vSphere® 5.1 Release Notes

vCloud Director 5.1 Release Notes

VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.1 Release Notes

VMware vCenter Infrastructure Navigator 1.2 Release Notes

vSphere Command-Line Interface 5.1 Release Notes

What’s New In ESXCLI 5.1

Documentation

VMware vSphere 5.1 Documentation

ESXi and vCenter Server Product Documentation Archives

Configuration Maximums for VMware vSphere 5.1

vSphere Command-Line Interface Documentation page

VMware vSphere PowerCLI Documentation page

vSphere Management Assistant Documentation page

VMware Sphere Replication Documentation page

VMware vCenter Update Manager Documentation page

VMware vCenter Orchestrator Documentation page

VMware vSphere Storage Appliance Documentation page

Knowledge Base

Installing vCenter Server 5.1 best practices

Methods of upgrading to vCenter Server 5.1

Upgrading to vCenter Server 5.1 best practices

Methods of installing ESXi 5.1

Installing or upgrading to ESXi 5.1 best practices

Methods of upgrading to ESXi 5.1

Location of ESXi 5.1 log files

Upgrading vCenter Server, ESX/ESXi hosts, and vShield Edge Appliances for vCloud Director 5.1

Network health check feature limitations in vSphere 5.1

Understanding vSphere 5.1 network rollback and recovery

Manually configuring HA slot sizes in vSphere 5.1

Upgrade paths from vSphere editions to VMware vCloud Suite 5.1

Network port requirements for vCloud Director 5.1

Installing vCloud Director 5.1 best practices

Supported web browsers in vCloud Director 5.1

Installing and configuring a vCloud Director 5.1 database

Supported guest operating systems in vCloud Director 5.1

Upgrading to vCloud Director 5.1 best practices

Licensing

vCloud Suite Licensing

VMware vSphere 5 Licensing, Pricing and Packaging

vSphere 5.1 Documentation Highlights - vCenter & SSO

 

Highlight of notable changes that deviate from past vSphere upgrade and authentication experiences

From KB Overview of upgrading from vCenter Server 5.0 to vCenter Server 5.1 & Comparing the behavior of vCenter Single Sign On with earlier versions of vCenter Server

·         In-place upgrades on 64-bit system of vCenter 4.0 & 5.0 are supported

·         You cannot migrate an older installation to a new 5.1 server (you must install the old version first then perform an in-place upgrade)

·         vCenter Server 5.1 cannot manage ESX 2.x or 3.x hosts

·         vCenter Single Sign On is a new service that may be installed with vCenter or on separate servers in a cluster/multisite high-availability configuration

o   “RSA” DB creation script must be run to create tables

o   ESXi 5.1 is not integrated with vCenter Single Sign On and you cannot create ESXi users with the vSphere Web Client. You must create and manage ESXi users with the vSphere Client.

o   Only the vSphere Web Client supports SSO.

·         vCenter Server Component Memory Requirements

	vCenter Server	Single Sign On	Inventory Service
vCenter Server RAM	4GB	3GB	3GB

o   10GB is the recommended RAM size if you run all components on a single server (vCenter Server, Inventory Service,  & Single Sign On).

·         SQL 2012 is NOT yet a supported DB.

Here are some additional SSO KB article you may wish to bookmark Configuration

·         Configuring vCenter Single Sign On for high availability

·         Installing vCenter Single Sign On in a multisite deployment

·         Setting up Apache load balancing software with vCenter Single Sign On

·         Configuring and troubleshooting vCenter Single Sign On password and lockout policies for accounts

·         Unlocking and resetting the vCenter Single Sign On (SSO) administrator password

·         Backup and restore the vCenter Single Sign On (SSO) configuration

·         Repointing and reregistering vCenter Server and components

Troubleshooting

·         vCenter Server 5.1 start up may take longer than previous versions

·         Understanding and troubleshooting vCenter Single Sign-On users, groups and login qualifications

·         Troubleshooting Single Sign On based vSphere Web Client login errors

·         Troubleshooting Single Sign on (SSO) issues in vCenter Server 5.1(2033137)

·         Troubleshooting the configuration of vCenter Single Sign On within the vCenter Server 5.1 Appliance (2033152)

·         Troubleshooting VMware Single Sign-On configuration and installation issues in a Windows server (2033880)

·         Troubleshooting failed log in attempts to the vSphere Web Client in vSphere 5.1 (2034506)

·         Troubleshooting SSL certificate updates and Single Sign On (2033240)

·         Troubleshooting vCenter Single Sign On when it does not start (2034517)