How can I use the P4500 included 10x HP VSA software licenses

[intelliserve]

Hi All, I've been searching for some time and still not clear on how I can use the HP Vsa licenses that were included with the P4500 purchase.

My intention was to setup 3x DL185/P4500 boxs with 12x2tb hard drives in each and use 2 VSA license per node to create 2 clusters of 3 nodes for backup stroage. Using a 6 of the 10 licenses.

Is this possible without licensing the DL185 boxs.

Basicly I have 3x old DL185 boxes with new drives and the single HP VSA key and I'm not sure what is the next to create this low cost backup solution. I was trying not to spend anything further however it appears I may have to setup these dl185 with it's own licensedd vsphere just to manage the single key.. It appears using the basic vsphere license if purchased I'm limited to just the 3 boxes so the other 4 vsa licenses can't be used.

Any ideas, thoughts or suggestions are welcome.
I was expecting that I could installed on the free vsx without vsphere.

Thank you

[oikjn]

I"m not sure about the ESXi licensing deal, but you could always roll some Hyper-V Server installs to run the VSAs.  That would be a 100% free option if you have spare hardware and don't want to pay any more for licensing.

I'm not a VMware guy so I don't know the options there, but I thought you could do single instances of esxi all you want as long as you don't care about central managment or the advanced features the licensing gets you.

[RonsDavis]

I run my VSA nodes on the free version of ESXi. I don't mind not having a vcenter for these single purpose nodes, and will never need to run backups on the vms. Great fit.

[intelliserve]

Thank you -   I must be missing something, when you have a single license key that is for 10 vsa licenses, Where do you enter the 'single supplied key' if not running vsphere.

[Prakash Singh_1]

For inlformation on HP VSA you can also browse here, http://h20584.www2.hp.com/hpgt/guides/select?lang=en&cc=in&prodTypeId=12169&prodSeriesId=3936136&lang=en&cc=in and select option:

VSA planning and installation and getting started with the Centralized Management Console (CMC)

[oikjn]

are you asking about how to turn that one key into the ten VSA licenses?

If so, I agree with you that its burried deep into the HP site!  I'm not gonna bother looking because it takes a while to find, but its somewhere in your licensing management site.  It might even be linked on one of the documents you should have gotten with the physical license.  When you follow the instructions on that sheet, and activate the single 10-pack license, it will give you ten different licenses that you can then individually activate.

FYI:  the feature keys you get are tied to a MAC address so make sure you setup the VSAs first and then use that information to activate them.

[George Vardikos]

Hello,

Sorry to dig this old thread, has anyone found the procedure toget the VSA licenses? I can't find anything in webfare.hp.com :(

[Sbrown]

just call them, they will walk you through software depot. it's really easy but the nomenclature of the site is somewhat confusing.