Question about VMware Tools when upgrading from vSphere 5.1 to 5.5

[pegasus20111014]

We are upgrading from vSphere 5.1 to 5.5. We still have a few VMs with outdated VMware Tools from vSphere 4.  Would there be any issues upgrading to vSphere 5.5 and then upgrading VMware Tools on these VMs to the 5.5 version?  Or, should we upgrade VMware Tools to version 5.1 first before doing the upgrade to vSphere 5.5? We would need to schedule downtime for the reboot when upgrading VMware Tools on these VMs and would prefer not to have to upgrade VMware Tools twice and schedule two downtimes

[rcporto · Accepted solution]

There is no problem, since vSphere ESXi 5.5 supports VM running older versions of VMware Tools.

This blog post explain this in more detail: Is a VMware Tools Upgrade Required When Upgrading vSphere? | VMware vSphere Blog - VMware Blogs

[SatyS]

As suggested by Richardson Porto you can upgrade the tools after upgrading the vSphere.

VMware Tools follow an extended support matrix which  allows you to upgrade your vCenter Server and vSphere hosts without having to worry about virtual machines falling out of compliance with support requirements or having to be concerned with the need to immediately follow the upgrade with a large number of virtual machine reboots in order to upgrade VMware Tools.

[Shirish_Madhari]

Yes you are correct about the VM needing reboot when upgrading VM tools from vsphere 4. However, upgrading VM tools from 5.1 to 5.5 would not need a reboot(on VMs running Vista or higher).

Please make sure that you are upgrading VMware tools before you upgrade the Virtual Machine Hardware as the VMware tools provides drivers for the new hardware.

You can find more details by referring to the KB Article: VMware KB: Determining if a VMware Tools upgrade requires a reboot of a Windows guest operating syst...

[pegasus20111014]

Thanks.  We'll upgrade vCenter first then.

For some reason I'm not seeing an option to award points in this thread, but will as soon as I see the option.  Thanks again