Upgrade hosts from ESXi Essentials to Standard

[dfosbenner]

I'm considering purchasing vCenter Standard.  I have 4 hosts now and will have 6-7 before long, and centralized management would help a lot.  The hosts are ESXi 5.5 Essentials, and my understanding is I'd need to upgrade Essentials to Standard.  What is the process here?  Is it simply a matter of installing the vSphere Standard license on the hosts?  Or do I need to install a new software package?

[a_p_ · Accepted solution]

No need to reinstall. Simply replace the license keys for vCenter Server and the hosts.

André

[dfosbenner]

Ahh, thank you Andre, and thank you VMware.  Finally, something easy. 

[dfosbenner]

So can I safely assume that the process of upgrading to vCenter Standard from the 3-host version that comes with Essentials is also just a matter of installing a new license key?

[a_p_]

Yes, simply assign the new license keys for vCenter Server and the hosts. No need to change anything else , except you want to use any of the additional feature that come with the standard edition.

André