It's possible downgrade vSphere release?

[Tguitarful]

Hello guys, i have an important question.
Is it possible to downgrade the release, for example 7.0.2 to 7.0.1 or just to an earlier version?
I migrated my host from 6.7 to 7.0.2 directly, but the software I use is not supported for this version 7.0.2, only 7.0.1

I didn’t want to go back to 6.7 and then go to 7 again, it’s a little scary, haha.

Moderator edit by wila: Moved thread from ESXi ARM Fling discussions to vSphere discussions area.

[vFouad]

This may be in the wrong spot as ESXi 6.7 was never available on ARM, but I'll let the admins sort that out later 🙂

The simplest option would be to roll back to 6.7 by pressing Shift R in the boot loader and seeing if roll back is an option.

https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1033604

There is no easy way to downgrade...

Assuming your Workload is on shared storage... you could just Maintenance mode your host, remove it from vCenter and re-install it, then add it back to the cluster and reconfigure the vDS if you have one.

Please share more details, for more help 🙂

vFouad

[Tguitarful]

I understand, I know that there is no easy way to do this.

An important note. Two of the hosts were updated using Update Manager using and when running the command:

tail -2 /*bootbank/boot.cfg

Only the current version appears.

One more detail, I will also need to downgrade vCenter. As vCenter only manages devices inferior to it, I will need to downgrade the ESXi first, but if at least in vCenter I had the option to go from 7.0.2 to 7.0.1 it would be great.

[vFouad]

so the screen grab only shows one bootbank; assuming that is a cropped/cut image and both bootbank and altbootbank are showing 7.0.2 then rollback is not an option 😞

re-install is the only supported path....

evac one host; reinstall

then reconfigure it;
then repeat on the other host.

unfortunately vCenter would also be a reinstall, if you have a backup of the configuration you could try import that, but it has a chance that there will be some configuration failures; given the version differences.

Sorry for the bad news... downgrade is not a supported operation....

Do you have snapshots of the VC before the upgrade? you could revert that way....

Why would you need to downgrade VC? 7.0.2 can manage 7.0.1 hosts... or is the application tied in to VC?

[Tguitarful]

Exactly,

My fear of having to reinstall is because of the VSphere Replication that I use. Reconfiguring it is kind of boring.
I still have vCenter 6.7 in my inventory. He's turned off.

Yes, the application collects data from both vCenter and ESXi.

[vFouad]

Unfortunately, you are correct.

Reinstalling the vCenter server will change the ID references; so you will need to stop replication and rebuild it...

If you are on VR 8.4 you might be able to use the import export tool for VR to avoid that task... so you may want to upgrade that first?

[Tguitarful]

One last doubt,

My hosts are connected to direct connect storage. Will it be necessary to reconfigure his connections?
vSwitch and PortGroup I know that I will have to reconfigure it. I also have a Tape Library via SAS Connection.

We use the VR 8.1

I'm a little confused in this update. As I will need to redo the vcenter too, should I disconnect the host from the current one first, then install esxi, then create a new vcenter and point it out?

[vFouad]

So in my experience the DAS just works without special configuration... if you don't use any special custom sas hba configuration from the software level, the driver should just pick up the device and it should just work... and your datastores should pop in...
The Tape library maybe a little more "fun" I'd document the configuration for that... I am assuming it is just passed through to a VM? like an RDM or passthrough device...

Building the new VC and connecting the reinstalled host would be an option, but it would require VM down time, as you power off, remove from inventory and then add and power on on the re-installed host...

If you just attach the 7.0.1 to the 7.0.2 VC you can vmotion the VMs, then when both hosts are done you can power off the vCenter and install a new 7.0.1 VC and build a new cluster and add the hosts... the VM's will stay running on the hosts during this process...

The config export tool for VR is not available for older versions so you would need to upgrade vr 8.1 to 8.4 in order to avoid rebuilding all the the replication jobs manually.