ESX 3.5 VS ESX3i

As most of you guys aware off, the VMware Inc are planned to removed the ESX 3.5 from the IT market in the future. As they claim the Linux Kernel which bundle on the ESX 3.5 is impacted the performance on the hypervisor Virtualization solution. VMware claim the ESX 3i is easier, faster and better always. My advice is, you may need to rethink to be reconsider if you plan to switch from ESX 3.5 to 3i. As recently we had seen the major bugs release from VMware last week, I do believe that ESX 3.5 is easier to be managed VS 3i as most of us are use to or familiar with Linux behave to tweak or trick around if needed. As today, we able to troubleshoot most of the stuff through Virtual Center or Linux command. If it go to 3i, which we have to deal with the immature support CLI command base or the power shell as the alternative. Personally 3i is cool, but it do reduce a lot of the flexibility we may need to manage and on going support in the production.

Couple of important point when we compare ESX 3.5 to 3I

1. Do we have redundancy or Raid 1 for the memory flash card been built in to your server? Which you can also install on the Raid 1 Disk on the installable version, but this will wasted the hard disk that you bought
   
2. How confident will VMware to guarantee with zero bugs on ESX 3i? (guess is not possible)
3. 3i is purely flash or Rom basis from the way it boot up. Minimal interaction can be done from management perspective even you are in front of the server. As in today, ESX 3.5 are still able to troubleshoot with Linux command and tweak around with the bugs we have. in 3i, seems we have nothing much can be done beside waiting for patch or flash release from VMware

Personally I do see performance improvement on 3I which have better through compare to ESX 3.5, but it still not mature as comparable to ESX 3.5