Vi 3.5 U2 to U4

[roity57]

Hi all,

I've searched the forums, read the upgrade guides and the release notes (most of anyway!!) for ESX 3.5 U4

I'm looking after an infrastructure comprising of VI 3.5 U2 with one vCenter server and 4 clusters of which all run HA/DRS etc. There are 3 "Datacenters" within VC server. There are a total of 13 servers across the whole thing, majority SAN attached to a Clariion CX3-40 & CX4-120 arrays and the hosts are all DELL M600 blades (except for 2 HP DL380 test servers).

All prod ESX hosts are 3.5.0 U2 and one test server is U3 and the 2nd test server is an ESXi U3. We also use VCB to backup selected machines on a weekly basis and for DR recovery and test network refreshing. We have VCB that ships with 3.5 U2 so we don't need to make any changes there (AFAIK!!) as that should be current.

I realise I need to upgrade VC Server first (backup database first), and ensure Update Manager etc. is upgraded and functional. My intention is then to baseline the update in VUM and update the hosts after VC server is updated.

My primary concern is that I don't want to upgrade all of the hosts in one swoop, I want to upgrade the VC Server and then atleast one host in each cluster to ensure everything is running ok. Is this a safe approach or could I see some inter-operability issues between U2 and U4? Also, what about vmware tools updates? from what I recall all the tools will appear out of date as soon as the VC server is upgraded so we'll just systematically update the tools, but again I don't want to see any guest tool issues or odd VCB behaviour.

I'm trying to be cautious as when U3 first came out I noted some serious issues.

Cheers,

Dave

[AndreTheGiant]

I want to upgrade the VC Server and then atleast one host in each cluster to ensure everything is running ok. Is this a safe approach or could I see some inter-operability issues between U2 and U4?

I also do the same.

Attach the baseline to a single ESX, test the upgrade, then attach to the whole cluster.

Also, what about vmware tools updates?

You can upgrade them later (cause there will be a downtime during VM reboot).

but again I don't want to see any guest tool issues or odd VCB behaviour.

No problem.

But remember that with VCB 1.5 pre-freeze scripts (if you use them) are changing name and position.

Andre

[roity57]

Now that's a fast reply, cheers!

If you're referring to the backupscripts.d folder path then that's covered... I been through that one! We don't use too many custom scripts though to be honest.

Thanks.

[AndreTheGiant]

If you're referring to the backupscripts.d folder path then that's covered

Other small issues could be with hardware monitoring in ESX. In some cases you loose this function or some sensors.

I do not remember other big issues.

Andre