In-place single server upgrade to vSphere 6?

[GSS344]

Hi,

I have a single server vsphere 5.5 u2 lab. Perhaps worthy to note, on the drive with the ESXi OS installed, are also VMs. I'd like to install vSphere 6 without disturbing the VMs (apart from downtime to the VMs, but no data risks). Is it possible to do an in place upgrade?

Looking on the iinternet, it looks as simple as applying any other patch for vsphere. Is this really the case? Also, is a vcenter upgrade first recommended (I use vcenter features such as distributed switches, etc)?

Thanks

[CoolRam]

You can connect the 6.0 CD drive and start the upgrade process while its cone to screen where you have choose upgrade the host without disturbing the datastore . you choose and finish the upgrade

You host will be upgraded without your datastore content intact.

[Ram8]

Hi,

Yes, you can upgrade without disturbing you VMs. You have multiple options to do that. Dowload the upgrade vib file and do it on cli or connect the cd and do an upgrade and choose to preserve the vmfs.

You can also create a vm with vcenter and do it through update manager.

Regards,

Ram.

[a_p_]

I use vcenter features such as distributed switches, etc.

Note that you need to upgrade vCenter prior to upgrading the host!

André

[GSS344]

Thanks guys. My vcenter 5.5 windows server setup is distributed. VM each for inventory svc, SSO, Web Client, vcenter + full SQL Server. My only confusion is that vcenter 6 does away with these roles so it's as if I need to migrate all those servers to one vcenter 6 server (or PSC).

Is there any guide on this sort of upgrade of a distributed vcenter 5.5 setup?