Proxmox or ESXI

[Bazadar]

Hi All,

I'm currently learning: Microsoft Windows Server 2012 Certification - Exam 70-410 - 411

 

I have a the following system spare: CPU: AMD Phenom II 1055T (6C) - Ram: 10GB - Storage: 1x 320HDD - 3x 1TB Drives

 

Now the 320HD had Win10 with a VM for Server2012, But this drive has died. So I was thinking installing either Proxmox or ESXI as my work place uses ESXI for Virtualisation, So was thinking could install this to get some hands on experience

 

I shouldnt have any issues installing either of those would I ?

 

Cheers

[NelizMastr]

ESXi is mostly picky on network cards. If it supports your onboard controller, you can install it without issue (ESXi setup will halt when no compatible card is found). Generally Realtek chipsets are either poorly supported or not at all (or require a driver pack you need to inject).

 

Btw, why are you getting your 2012 certification now? The product is in its extended support period already and not installed on new equipment anymore.

[Bazadar]

Was a really cheap course todo for now.

 

Will be doing 2016 but just waiting on the business to get all the courses everyone wants todo together

 

Would you says go with ESXi over Proxmox? As Long as its install just fine

[NelizMastr]

18 minutes ago, Bazadar said:

Was a really cheap course todo for now.

 

Will be doing 2016 but just waiting on the business to get all the courses everyone wants todo together

 

Would you says go with ESXi over Proxmox? As Long as its install just fine

It's mostly personal preference, imo. I want to dive into proxmox more, but it's hard to leave ESXi for me as it's what I've been using for god knows how long.

[Bazadar]

1 hour ago, NelizMastr said:

It's mostly personal preference, imo. I want to dive into proxmox more, but it's hard to leave ESXi for me as it's what I've been using for god knows how long.

Cool, Ill have a play with them see what works. Thanks for the Input @NelizMastr

[dalekphalm]

I personally use ESXi w/ vCenter at work, in a 2 server cluster. It works great (assuming compatible hardware). Because of that, I opted to use ESXi (just the free license without vCenter) at home for my home server, and it's been running flawlessly.

 

ProxMox is essentially very similar and by all accounts, works very well. ESXi is pretty much THE standard in the industry though, so if you're learning this for your career skills and knowledge, knowing ESXi is probably more useful.

 

Ideally, you'd want to learn both, though, but that's a larger time sink.

[Jay Deah]

Firstly, i'm an ESXi guy... so im biased towards it...

 

what to use would depend on what you want to learn and why... if its's just the Microsoft certification then use Hyper-V. as that's far more relevant and all the lab things interface with that super-easy. infact you dont even need windows server they have labs for all their exams that will run off of windows 10.

 

If on the other the and you want to learn about enterprise virtualisation then use either Hyper-V or ESXi. these are the 2 big players in the market. vSphere is arguably better but comes with a huge pricetag so you'll tend to find it in larger and/or older organisations. Hyper-V is catching up to ESXi in the functioanlity space, but sicne it is included with the windows license you buy anyway to license the VMs it has a much lower licensing cost, and so is VERY attractive to organisations.

 

If you come across things like proxmox, unraid etc. in the workplace they'll tend to be smaller,  crappier companies.

[Mikensan]

In business environments the two I've seen are HyperV and ESXi. ESXi scales better in my opinion, with a lot more solutions for datacenters. I haven't seen any KVM based solutions personally. That said, Nutanix is gained a lot of popularity (which can use ESXi or their own KVM spinoff).

 

In terms of gainig useful insight or learning something to benefit your career, I would run ESXi or HyperV.

 

Also Server 2019 is out - unless you are actually learning / gaining knowledge from the 2012 course, I wouldn't bother. 2016 and 2019 are different enough that the 2012 certificate won't mean much to a 2016+ environment without years of M$ experience.