Just a quick post, albeit a few days late, to make those of you still running VMware ESX 3.5 aware that VMware have recently (4th December) released a new update for it – Update 5 (U5) which is available to download and install via all the usual update methods.

So if you’re still running a version of ESX 3.5 you may want to consider upgrading to this new release which offers the following enhancements (from the VMware ESX 3.5 Update 5 release notes which can be found here):

Enablement of Intel Xeon Processor 3400 Series – Support for the Intel Xeon processor 3400 series has been added. Support includes Enhanced VMotion capabilities. For additional information on previous processor families supported by Enhanced VMotion, see Enhanced VMotion Compatibility (EVC) processor support (KB 1003212).

Driver Update for Broadcom bnx2 Network Controller – The driver for bnx2 controllers has been upgraded to version 1.6.9. This driver supports bootcode upgrade on bnx2 chipsets and requires bmapilnx and lnxfwnx2 tools upgrade from Broadcom. This driver also adds support for Network Controller – Sideband Interface (NC-SI) for SOL (serial over LAN) applicable to Broadcom NetXtreme 5709 and 5716 chipsets.

Driver Update for LSI SCSI and SAS Controllers – The driver for LSI SCSI and SAS controllers is updated to version 2.06.74. This version of the driver is required to provide a better support for shared SAS environments.

Newly Supported Guest Operating Systems – Support for the following guest operating systems has been added specifically for this release:

For more complete information about supported guests included in this release, see the VMware Compatibility Guide: http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php?deviceCategory=software.

• Windows 7 Enterprise (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Windows 7 Professional (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Windows 7 Home Premium (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Windows 2008 R2 Standard Edition (64-bit)
• Windows 2008 R2 Enterprise Edition (64-bit)
• Windows 2008 R2 Datacenter Edition (64-bit)
• Windows 2008 R2 Web Server (64-bit)
• Ubuntu Desktop 9.04 (32-bit and 64-bit)
• Ubuntu Server 9.04 (32-bit and 64-bit)

Newly Supported Management Agents – See VMware ESX Server Supported Hardware Lifecycle Management Agents for current information on supported management agents.

Newly Supported Network Cards – This release of ESX Server supports HP NC375T (NetXen) PCI Express Quad Port Gigabit Server Adapter.

Newly Supported SATA Controllers – This release of ESX Server supports the Intel Ibex Peak SATA AHCI controller.

Of note is the newly found support for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 along with increased support for more SATA, network cards and controllers.

This useful table courtesy of VMware provides a nice easy way of determining your supported upgrade path to Update 5.

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