ESX 3.0.1 to 3.5 questions/concerns..

[infinitiguy]

I have 2(soon to be 3 esx servers) 2 are at 3.0.1 w/ vc2.0.1 and the third I will build straight to esx 3.5.

Now, I've read that esx 3.0.1 can work with vc 2.5 without some patches.. which I'm not that keen on installing... I'd rather just upgrade my hosts completely. My question is.. can I run two virtual center environments(even if I just have a license for one) for an interim until I get all my stuff upgraded? Or will that not work?

[Texiwill]

Hello,

Your ESX v3.5 licensing will dictate what you can do, but generally not. It depends on how many VC licenses you actually have. But VC2.5 will manage 3.0.x servers and I would use that and plan on upgrading as soon as possible.

Note that if you use MSCS or any other form of shared disk clusters that is not currently supported on v3.5.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education. As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[infinitiguy]

that's what I figured. What I was trying to avoid was having to patch my esx3.0.1 servers at all.

I don't think I can really avoid that though... I can't migrate my machines without VC.. and I can't upgrade my machines without VC since I need to migrate between them... What a mess

So I think what I'll have to do is... move my dev machines to my new unmanaged 3.5 box(lun re-point.. not a migrate).. then patch my empty ESX server to allow for 3.0.1 under 2.5.. Migrate my production machines to 3.0.1 (patched) then patch the 2nd production machine.

Then I can upgrade virtual center to 2.5.. then I can upgrade both my ESX servers to 3.5(one... migrate.. do the 2nd..)

does that all sound logical?

[Texiwill · Accepted solution]

Hello,

It does sounds logical. When I went to 3.5, I upgraded VC to 2.5, upgraded one server then the other. I did not have the latest patches installed as this was about 6 months ago, and I could still vMotion VMs to from each server.

I would test on your dev systems and see if this will work for you as well, the extra patch step may not be necessary for vMotion to work.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education. As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[infinitiguy]

Part of my concern with VC2.5 is the posts I read about 3.0.1 machines managed under VC2.5 that weren't patched.. their VM's could randomly reboot. I'm running domain controllers, web servers and other services that I don't want to have randomly reboot which is why I'm so tied to patching 3.0.1 if I have to have it managed under vc2.5

You've given me some good info though.

Cheers,

[Texiwill]

Hello,

I upgraded pretty soon after 2.5/3.5 came out, and my 3.0.2 machines were patched to the latest at that time. No random reboots, granted, I did the upgrades for all servers within a single day. Never experienced the described issues however. In your case it is something I would definitely test within a development lab. I would even go as far as getting an evaluation license so that you have a second VC license for a short period of time (60 days). This way you get a second VC server as well.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education. As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[smudge1977]

I have vc 2.5 managing 3.0.1 hosts with only these patches installed:

ESX-1002101 ESX-1002085 ESX-1003352 ESX-1002094

Which is not as per this document, however all seems fine!