Hello,
I've upgraded my esxi5.1 free to esxi5.5 free. Now, for various reasons, I need to go back to 5.1.
I've installed 5.1 on top of 5.5 (upgrading), but i still see the 5.5 in the version info, even though the image is noted 5.1.
Recovery mode shows 5.1 (default) and 5.5 :smileyalert:
Anyone with a solution for this?
Via SSH, run the following command. What kind of output does this produce?
~ # uname -a
5.5.0 #1 SMP Release build-1331820 Sep 18 2013 23:08:31 x86_64 GNU/Linux
:smileyangry:
So, in fact you are still running 5.5. Is it an option to install 5.1 on a USB stick, or to format the device on which ESXi is installed? If not you can install it on a USB stick and set the BIOS boot order accordingly.
I guess that a USB install is possible.
In regards to a new install, I am somewhat worried since i have a storage connected. Will the mounted drives and data remain?
With a new install, no, you have to recreate this.
While using the VMA, you can use
vicfg-cfgbackup
To backup the current configuration.
Hi,
I successfuly downgraded 5.5 to 5.1 in our LAB environmenrt using vicfg-cfgbackup with small work-around. The Keypoint was to to change the first line in the Manifest.txt to show a 5.1 config.
1. use "vicfg-cfgbackup -s 5.5config.tgz
" to save the 5.5 config to a gzipped tar ball
2. extract the archive with "tar xzf 5.5config.tgz
" to a temp. directory
3. edit the Manifest.txt and change the line
RELEASELEVEL=VMware ESXi 5.5.0 GA
to
RELEASELEVEL=VMware ESXi 5.1.0 Update 2
4. create new tar archive with "tar czf 5.1config.tgz Manifest.txt state.tgz
"
5. install a fresh ESXi5.1 (choose install instead of upgrade, but keep the local datastores if any)
5. apply the new config to a fresh ESXi5.1 with "vicfg-cfgbackup -l 5.1config.tgz...
"
I kept the physical network and storage environment unchanged while downgrading and after the config restore, all the settings and even registered VMs were present.
Cheers