skylake EVC

[kwg66]

we just acquired a school of skylake blades, using a fish reference here just for fun, and yet vCenter doesn't have an option for skylake EVC..  does anyone have anything they can share about this?

[MohamadAlhousse]

Hi kwg66​

Please can you check if the below can help. It is for "Intel Xeon Platinum 8100 (Skylake-SP) Series"

VMware Compatibility Guide - cpu

Regards,

[kwg66]

Oh I see it there on the list, but I don't see it within vCenter \ host configuration option..  Why am I not seeing skylake as an EVC mode?  Intel(R) Xeon(R) Gold 5118 is the CPU....   

Is there something I need to do to get skylake visible and enabled?   the latest EVC mode I see is Broadwell.. 

[virtualg_uk]

Could it be that since Skylake is the most current CPU version, you don't need an EVC mode for it?

If you need a host to use Skylake features, just leave the EVC mode disabled?

Intel CPU EVC Matrix (VMware Enhanced vMotion Compatibility) | Virten.net

[roman79]

Hi kwg66 ,

It looks like a limitation in vCenter 6.5, and Skylake EVC will probably be introduced in the next version of vSphere - https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1003212.

For example, vCenter 6.0 supports EVC mode up to Haswell Generation for Intel chips.

In vCenter 6.5, it is updated to Intel Broadwell Gen.

Hope this information helps.

[Finikiez]

Hi!

Usually VMware updates EVC levels with vcenter updates.

For example Broadwell EVC level appeared in vcenter 6.5, however you could use broadwell CPUs in vsphere 6.0 without any problem. That was only EVC level missing.

So I suppose that Skylake EVC level will be added in something like 6.5U2 or the next major release.

At the moment you can just keep EVC disabled or enable it with Broadwell level and upgrade it as soon as it appears in the next version.

[kwg66]

Thanks everyone for chiming in.   Skylake has been around a while, I would have expected VMware to have an EVC mode for it already, it can be turned on in the future when the mode is available with new versions.