The next version of vSphere is currently in public beta state. While the beta is still under NDA, VMware has announced some features at their VMworld 2014 conference:
- Multi-CPU Fault Tolerance
- vMotion Enhancements (Cross vCenter, long distance, NSX)
- Virtual Datacenters
- Virtual Volumes
Multi-CPU Fault Tolerance
Fault Tolerance is going to support virtual machines with 4 vCPUs and 64GB of RAM. The SMP-FT called feature uses a fast checkpointing mechanism to keep primary and secondary VMs in sync. Fast checkpointing replaces the Record/Replay technology that was previously used.
vMotion Enhancements
Through vSphere 5.5, vMotion was limited to the vCenter/Datacenter boundary. With vSphere 6.0 vMotion can migrate Virtual Machines across vCenters, virtual switches and routed networks.
Virtual Datacenters
vSphere 6.0 goes one step further than resource Pools. A Virtual Datacenter aggregates CPU, Memory, Storage and Network resources.
Virtual Volumes
vVols is a new approach on how storage is deployed, managed and consumed by making the storage VM-centric. Currently we have storage that is LUN- or Volume-centric. VVols makes storage VM-centric by making the storage arrays aware of individual VMDK files.
vSphere 6 is currently in a public beta. Everyone can register and test out upcoming features.