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The traditional (full) ESX Server has a special built-in virtual machine called the ³service
console´. This service console is really a modified version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux that
is installed and running in every ESX Server by default. The service console has special
access to the VMware-proprietary VMFS file system. 3rd party applications can be installed
in the service console and Linux-based utilities can be run in the service console.
Additionally, VMware includes a number of ESX-related tools in the service console, most of
which start with ³  and they are run by accessing the service console with SSH.

As VMware ESXi Server has no service console, there is no SSH access to the server and
there are no 3rd party applications that can be installed on the server. However, there are also
benefits to NOT having these features (discussed more below).


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As ESXi doesn¶t have any CLI with VMware-related or Linux utilities, VMware needed to
provide a CLI interface to ESXi. What VMware came up with is the Remote Command line
Interface (RCLI). This is an application that you typically install as a VM and it is used to
perform scheduled or ad hock scripting on the VMware Infrastructure. The ESXi RCLI is its
own command line where ESX server service console scripting would be made up of mostly
Linux utilities.

For more information on how to manage ESXi, take a look at Managing VMware ESXi.

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Because the service console has been removed from ESXi, the footprint in memory has been
reduced to just 32MB. In my opinion, it is truly amazing that you can run a hypervisor,
allowing you to run virtual machines on your server, with just 32MB of RAM overhead. In
comparison, the full ESX Server on disk footprint is about 2GB.

Because the hypervisor is so small, the installation happens in about 10 minutes (or so) and
the server boots up in 1-2 minutes. This is quite different from the full ESX server installation
and boot, both of which are longer.

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While ESXi is so small that it can be easily installed and can even be booted from a USB
Flash disk, what is truly unique about ESXi is that it is being sold by hardware vendors as a
built-in hypervisor. That means that, say, you buy a Dell server, ESXi can be built inside the
server (embedded) on a flash chip, on the motherboard. There is no installation of ESXi on
disk.

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As there is no service console to protect with the ESX Server security profile (software
firewall), the security profile configuration in ESXi is very simplistic. The ESXi security
profile configuration consists of a couple of services that you can either enable or not enable
with inbound access. Here is a comparison between the two:

h!0ESXi Security Profile ± only 2 services

h! 0 VMware ESX Server (full) Security Profile

For more information on how to configure VMware ESX Server Security Profiles ± see my
VirtualizationAdmin.com article How to schedule tasks with the VMware Infrastructure
Client and ESX Server.

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1

Instead of the full ESX Server ³service console´ boot (which looks like a Linux server
booting), ESXi has a tiny ³Direct Console User Interface (DCUI)´. Unofficially, I like to call
this the ³yellow firmware console´. In this ESXi console, all that you can configure are some
very basic ESXi server options such as the root user password, network settings, and a couple
other items. In the graphic below, you can see why I call it ³yellow´:


h!&0ESXi yellow firmware console / DCUI

Because this tiny firmware console (did I mention that it¶s yellow?) has so few features, the
server is virtually ³stateless´. A new server can be configured in seconds because there is
almost nothing to configure.

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With ESXi some hardware monitoring features are built into the hypervisor. With ESX
Server, this is not yet built in. Instead, you must install hardware monitoring software in the
service console. For more information on ESXi server health status and how to install
vendor-specific utilities to provide similar information on ESX Servers, please see my article:
Obtaining server health status in VMware ESX and VMware ESXi.
 
h!*0ESXi Health Status

3

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As ESXi is relatively new and as ESX server has the option to install code for advanced ESX
Server features, not all features available in the full ESX Server are also available in ESXi. In
fact, I have had issues getting VMware High Availability (VMHA) to work in ESXi. VMHA
was not officially supported on ESXi until some recent patches came out for ESXi. Still, even
after the patches, I had difficulties with ESXi and VMHA.

There are other ESX Server features that are ³experimental´ on ESXi. For the full list visit:
Differences in Supported Networking Features Between ESX Server 3.5 and ESX Server 3i

5
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Because the full ESX server essentially has a modified Linux system as the service console,
there are many patches that have to be deployed to keep it secure. With ESXi, on the
contrary, the server has very few patches that need to be applied. Because ESXi has no
service console and it is considered more secure and more reliable. Security, Reliability, and
Maintainability, are all major factor when considering a hypervisor.

7
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8*5,

With the full version of ESX Server, the least expensive purchase option is the Foundation
(Starter) kit for about $1,500, while you can purchase ESXi only (with no support) for $495.
On the other hand, if you do get the Foundation kit, you not only get the full ESX Server but
also ESXi and a number of VMware Infrastructure Suite options. Still, obtaining ESXi for
under $500 allows a server to do so much more than it ever could before.

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I am not here to sell you on VMware, on ESX Server, or ESXi Server, what I am here to do is
to inform you of the drastic differences between these two versions of ³ESX Server´. In my
opinion, ESX Server (full) must be used if you have 3rd party apps or if you just want to have
access to the ³Linux-style´ service console.

On the other hand, if you are willing to give up those two benefits, with ESXi, you will get an
ESXi Server that boots faster, has fewer patches to deploy, and is more reliable. ESXi is also
the least expensive option.

I recommend testing both VMware ESX Server and ESXi server. Both are available for a free
evaluation download from VMware Inc.

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