We're happy to announce that on 02 March 2017 we released an the VMware Validated Design for Software-Defined Data Center 4.0.

The VMware Validated Designs provide our customers prescriptive guidance and tools, to plan, build, and operate a Software-Defined Data Center. The designs are extensively tested to ensure all components and their specific versions are validated to work in unison, to scale to predetermined design objectives, and operate as our customers expect. Unlike Reference Architectures which may focus on an individual product or purpose without lifecycle management guidance, the VVD for SDDC is a holistic approach to designing a full SSDC stack, applicable to a broad set of uses with a commitment to ongoing upgrade guidance.

What's New?





Version 4.0 is the first release to incorporate the vSphere 6.5 wave of products. The Bill Of Materials (BOM) has been completely refreshed to all new versions of the SDDC products. This means VVD customers are able to take advantage of the new performance enhancements, scalability, and robustness which is included in these latest versions.





This substantial platform uplift in 4.0, the first major vSphere version refresh since the 1.0 design launch, demonstrates the strength and flexibility inherent to the VVD design, enabling existing customers to seamlessly upgrade their full SDDC stack.





Product Group and Edition Product Name Product Version VMware vSphere Enterprise Plus ESXi 6.5 a vCenter Server Appliance 6.5 a vSphere Update Manager 6.5 a VMware vSAN Standard or higher vSAN 6.5 VMware vSphere Replication VMware vSphere Replication 6.5 VMware Site Recovery Manager Enterprise VMware Site Recovery Manager 6.5 VMware NSX for vSphere Enterprise NSX for vSphere 6.3 * VMware vRealize Automation Advanced or higher vRealize Automation 7.2 vRealize Orchestrator 7.2 vRealize Orchestrator Plug-in for NSX 1.0.4 VMware vRealize Business for Cloud Advanced vRealize Business for Cloud 7.2 VMware vRealize Operations Manager Advanced or higher vRealize Operations Manager 6.4 vRealize Operations Management Pack for NSX for vSphere 3.5 vRealize Operations Management Pack for vRealize Log Insight 1.0.1 vRealize Operations Management Pack for vRealize Automation 2.1 vRealize Operations Management Pack for Storage Devices 6.0.5 VMware vRealize Log Insight vRealize Log Insight 4.0 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for NSX for vSphere 3.5 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for vSAN 2.0 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for vRealize Automation 7 1.5 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for vRealize Orchestrator 7.0.1+ 2.0 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for vRealize Operations Manager 6.x 1.7 vRealize Log Insight Content Pack for Microsoft SQL Server 3.1 VMware vSphere Data Protection vSphere Data Protection 6.1.3

* Shortly before VMware Validated Designs 4.0 released, VMware released the NSX for vSphere 6.3.1 patch which includes an important hotfix. VMware Validated Designs supports this hotfix and VMware recommends that you apply it immediately.

VMware makes available patches and releases to address critical security issues for several products. Verify that you are using the latest security patches for a given component when deploying VMware Validated Design.

This release provides the following new features:

Updated Bill of Materials that incorporates new product versions

All new SDDC roles and personas guidance

Platform Services Controllers in each region are now behind an NSX load balancer

Use of host profiles to deploy ESXi on the hosts in the management and the shared edge and compute pods.

New operational guidance for certificate replacement of the SDDC management cluster

Support for SHA-2 Certificates

NSX distributed logical router for the shared edge and compute cluster

Improved free space recommendations for vSAN and NFS datastores

Less nodes required for the analytics cluster of vRealize Operations Manager

Now using syslog to send log data from vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller to vRealize Log Insight

Implemented SSL for log forwarding

Incorporated the use of vSphere Update Manager for upgrading ESXi hosts

Adoption of service accounts for secure application-to-application communication





For more information, and to get started:



