Chapter 3

Installing and Configuring vCenter Server

In the majority of today's information systems, the client-server architecture is king. This emphasis is because the client-server architecture has the ability to centralize management of resources and to provide end users and client systems with access to those resources in a simplified manner. Information systems used to exist in a flat, peer-to-peer model, when user accounts were required on every system where resource access was needed and when significant administrative overhead was needed simply to make things work. That is how managing a large infrastructure with many ESXi hosts feels without vCenter Server. vCenter Server brings the advantages of the client-server architecture to the ESXi host and to VM management.