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About XenServer Legacy Licenses


Ventsyslav Vassilev

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3 hours ago, bertland hope said:

 

Friend thanks,

- what was done in this step? I am currently importing to 5.6 xen hosts to 6.2 xen server. I will then upgrade 6.2 to 7.1 

 

Am i on the right track?

 

Possible. I just decided to skip 6.x and go with a clean 7.6 install. After that the machines were imported without issues (thanks god). Just be sure your hardware is supported across the versions! Particularly, take care with the storage controllers!

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12 minutes ago, Ventsyslav Vassilev said:

Well, 5 months after i started this thread - here is what happened in my case:

1. I was able to update to 7.6/E003 by simply exporting all my VMs, washing out the old version and doing a clean install.

2. The import back went with almost no issues.

3. The main problem was the downtime of the VMs - for example, one of them took almost 20 hours for export/import with a disk of 300 GB.

 

Sound easy like 1,2,3, but:

1. For me, this Citrix decision (to stop issuing licenses for the old versions) is, at least, unfair to me.

Let me be clear - i have no problem with the stopped support, but the stopped free licenses are totally unfair and surprised me a lot. Many of us use XenServer within a closed environments, in a private local networks. Their servers/VMs are working well for years and they do not need anything besides that. And suddenly Citrix decides what is better for us, forcing us to upgrade when this is not needed in any terms. That is really dissapointing. They just order us to upgrade without any chance for anything else. Why just not allow the customers to deal with the old versions on their own responsibility?

2. In my particular case - it was a huge luck that our servers were able to be upgraded because of the totally inconsistent HCLs.

3. One good point - the disc coalescing problems are fixed - at least in my case.

4. I upgraded and a week or two later - version 8 was released. I immediately checked the HCLs and what was the result - my CPUs (Xeon E5620) are no more supported, my storage controller (a quite popular LSI) - also.

This is simply unbelievable, if we wanted to use the most recent version - we are now not only forced to upgrade the Hypervisor, but also the hardware which is costing thousands of dollars.

Unfortunately - this is not the same Citrix experience i loved 10 years ago.

 

Without insulting anyone - this the fact...

 

Friend thanks,

- what was done in this step? I am currently importing to 5.6 xen hosts to 6.2 xen server. I will then upgrade 6.2 to 7.1 

 

Am i on the right track?

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Well, 5 months after i started this thread - here is what happened in my case:

1. I was able to update to 7.6/E003 by simply exporting all my VMs, washing out the old version and doing a clean install.

2. The import back went with almost no issues.

3. The main problem was the downtime of the VMs - for example, one of them took almost 20 hours for export/import with a disk of 300 GB.

 

Sound easy like 1,2,3, but:

1. For me, this Citrix decision (to stop issuing licenses for the old versions) is, at least, unfair to me.

Let me be clear - i have no problem with the stopped support, but the stopped free licenses are totally unfair and surprised me a lot. Many of us use XenServer within a closed environments, in a private local networks. Their servers/VMs are working well for years and they do not need anything besides that. And suddenly Citrix decides what is better for us, forcing us to upgrade when this is not needed in any terms. That is really dissapointing. They just order us to upgrade without any chance for anything else. Why just not allow the customers to deal with the old versions on their own responsibility?

2. In my particular case - it was a huge luck that our servers were able to be upgraded because of the totally inconsistent HCLs.

3. One good point - the disc coalescing problems are fixed - at least in my case.

4. I upgraded and a week or two later - version 8 was released. I immediately checked the HCLs and what was the result - my CPUs (Xeon E5620) are no more supported, my storage controller (a quite popular LSI) - also.

This is simply unbelievable, if we wanted to use the most recent version - we are now not only forced to upgrade the Hypervisor, but also the hardware which is costing thousands of dollars.

Unfortunately - this is not the same Citrix experience i loved 10 years ago.

 

Without insulting anyone - this the fact...

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13 hours ago, Alan Lantz said:

What everyone seems to be doing with old versions is download XenDesktop trial which comes with a XenServer license that is unlimited.

 

--Alan--

 

 

Thank you Alan, I have downloaded Citrix Virtual  Apps and Desktop 7 but i cannot see the XenDesktop trial which you speak of! Can you share a link? Please

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33 minutes ago, Alan Lantz said:

What everyone seems to be doing with old versions is download XenDesktop trial which comes with a XenServer license that is unlimited.

 

--Alan--

 

Hi Alan, Quick Question where can i find this program I do not want to download the incorrect version?

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If you have a pool with multiple slaves and you have to resources pull one of the servers out of the pool

and upgrade all of your BIOS/Firware then install XenServer 7.x clean.  Run it for a week or two then 

start export/importing VM's/upgrading XenTools over and do this until all servers/VM's are migrated.

Unfortunately with XenServer 5.x you can't do storage migrations so export/import is the only way

to get you data on the new platform.

 

--Alan--

 

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You cannot upgrade directly from 5.6 to 7.X - check the XS 7.X installation guide for details, but an intermediate upgrade to 6.X is necessary, if I recall correctly.

As to functionality, the 6.5 servers will still run but you will not be able to make any changes (no new VMs, no changes to existing HW configurations, for example) to the existing 5.6 environment.

 

-=Tobias

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14 hours ago, David Cottingham said:

The legacy activation server will go offline in March 2019, hence you're correct that most features of Free 5.6 will cease to work a few months after the time the activation license is created. We're doing this because XenServer 5.6 has been out of security support for over 4 years, during which time various vulnerabilities have been found, and hotfixed for versions that are within support. We would strongly recommend upgrading to XenServer 7.x. 

So - that means that all virtual machines running under 5.6 hypervisor will stop working, correct?

If so - will they be able to be imported in a 7.x install or we need to recreate them from scratch?

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The legacy activation server will go offline in March 2019, hence you're correct that most features of Free 5.6 will cease to work a few months after the time the activation license is created. We're doing this because XenServer 5.6 has been out of security support for over 4 years, during which time various vulnerabilities have been found, and hotfixed for versions that are within support. We would strongly recommend upgrading to XenServer 7.x. 

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