hmmm. So sounds like if it's Essential Kit 4 that we won't need any downtime but it will require a vCenter Mangement server? I ask because we really don't care about the Mgmt server at this stage and would prefer not to mess with it if possible (just connect direct to each host via vCenter client). The more I'm thinking about what you are saying, I'm thinking we might have to deploy the Essentials Kit vCenter Mgmt Server. (boo)
What changes in your response with Essentials Kit 5 (compared to 4)? Whatever we buy, the bottomline is that we want vSphere 4.1 running on each of the 3 hosts we'll have. Does that necessitate us having to have Essentials Kit 4 or can we downgrade the Essentials Kit 5? I'll probably send an email similar to this to our VMware regional sales rep and SE but any customer insights would be helpful too.