ESXi 4.0 to ESXi 6.7

[microchipmatt]

Hello All, I have a Dell server on ESXi 4.0, I have an extra license for ESXi 6.7.  I would like to upgrade this Dell server's Hypervisor from ESXi 4.0 to ESXi 6.7, Keeping the DATASTORE in tact.  Is this a valid UPGRADE Path, to preserve the Datastore in between each upgrade up to 6.7:

ESXi 4.0 (Do I have to go to 4.1 first?)--> ESXi 5.5.0 Update 3 --> ESXi 6.0.0 Update 3--> ESXi 6.7.0 Update 3

Thanks in advance for your confirmation.

[e_espinel]

Hello.
The first thing is to validate up to which version of VMware vSphere supports the physical server.
Attached link

https://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php

It is always necessary to make a full backup of all your VMs.

As it is in a very very old version, the ideal and optimal would be to perform a clean install of the version you choose and configure the ESXi host and then load the VMs in the datastore.

[vwaghule]

Hello,

First you would definitely need to confirm the compatibility of your Hardware from the Vmware Compatibility guide.

The upgrade path you decided seems to be appropriate, i.e. from 4.0 >> 5.5 U3 >> 6.0 U3 >> 6. 7

Below link is for the vmware ESXi upgrade path, above path you can confirm there,

https://interopmatrix.vmware.com/#/Upgrade?productId=1

The VMFS partitions if you are using they can be on atmost vmfs3 version with ESXi 4.

You would also need to upgrade them to atleast vmfs5 as that is the least version compatible with ESXi 6.7

[larstr]

microchipmatt,
ESXi 4 was end of life in 2013 and ESXi 6.7 was released in 2018.  ESXi don't typically support servers older than 5 years old for new versions and you probably have an install from before 2013. I suspect that you will need new hardware and migrate VMs instead of troubling through a multi step upgrade.

Lars