VMware ESXi and vSphere 6.5 Update 3 Released

In early April VMware released Update 2 for vSphere 6.7, which is the latest version of their hypervisor code base. Some organizations are slow to adopt the latest hypervisor though, and for their part VMware does a good job at continuing maintenance releases for ESXi and vSphere. That's the case for the 6.5 release, which saw Update 3 be made generally available earlier this week.

In early April VMware released Update 2 for vSphere 6.7, which is the latest version of their hypervisor code base. Some organizations are slow to adopt the latest hypervisor though, and for their part VMware does a good job at continuing maintenance releases for ESXi and vSphere. That's the case for the 6.5 release, which saw Update 3 be made generally available earlier this week.

What's New: VMware ESXi 6.5 Update 3

• The ixgben driver adds queue pairing to optimize CPU efficiency.
• With ESXi 6.5 Update 3 you can track license usage, refresh switch topology and see improvements in the search and Developer Center in the vSphere Client.
• ESXi 6.5 Update 3 provides legacy support for AMD Zen 2 servers.
• Multiple driver updates: ESXi 6.5 Update 3 provides updates to the lsi-msgpt2, lsi-msgpt35, lsi-mr3, lpfc/brcmfcoe, qlnativefc, smartpqi, nvme, nenic, ixgben, i40en and bnxtnet drivers.
• ESXi 6.5 Update 3 provides support for Windows Server Failover Clustering and Windows Server 2019.
• ESXi 6.5 Update 3 adds the com.vmware.etherswitch.ipfixbehavior property to distributed virtual switches to enable you to choose how to track your inbound and outbound traffic, and utilization. With a value of 1, the com.vmware.etherswitch.ipfixbehavior property enables sampling in both ingress and egress directions. With a value of 0, you enable sampling in egress direction only, which is also the default setting.

ESXI 6.5 Update 3 Release Notes

What's New: VMware vCenter Server 6.5 Update 3

• With vCenter Server 6.5 Update 3, events related to adding, removing, or modifying user roles display the user that initiates the changes.
• vSphere Auditing Improvements: vCenter Server 6.5 Update 3 improves VMware vCenter Single Sign-On auditing by adding events for the following operations: user management, login, group creation, identity source, and policy updates. The new feature is available only for vCenter Server Appliance with an embedded Platform Services Controller and not for vCenter Server for Windows or vCenter Server Appliance with an external Platform Services Controller. Supported identity sources are vsphere.local, Integrated Windows Authentication (IWA), and Active Directory over LDAP.
• External database support: vCenter Server 6.5 Update 3 adds support to Microsoft SQL Server 2014 SP3.

VMware vCenter Server 6.5 Update 3 Release Notes