VMware has just GA their vSphere 6.5 and there are some really good enhancements such as
- Native high availability for vCenter
- Improved HTML 5 based vSphere client
- VM-level encryption
- Easy migration from Windows vCenter to vCenter appliance
plus much much more
I have included some links here to the key documents to read through as a starter in the order that I feel I would normally read:
- First point for me is to read the release notes
http://pubs.vmware.com/Release_Notes/en/vsphere/65/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-65-release-notes.html
- White paper for whats new in vSphere 6.5
- Check what VMware products are compatibility with vSphere 6.5 so you don't get caught out thinking just upgrading to vSphere 6.5 it will work with all your existing VMware products. ie If you was using Site Recovery Manager (SRM) you would need to upgrade SRM 6.5 as well which means you would need to plan out your migration
- Check if it will work on your current hardware infrastructure
- Check if the Guest OS that you are currently running on your vSphere environment is supported under vSphere 6.5
- Configuration maximums
- Compare which edition has which features. As usual Enterprise + edition will have the most of the new features
http://www.vmware.com/products/vsphere.html (Click on "Compare" and it will take you see see all the features and which editions has those features
- Finally the document library where all the usual installation and user guides are
Hope you find the links useful
