esx upgrade

[ashoc123]

Currently my setup has 6 ESX in a cluster with v3.5 (2 boxes) & v4.0(4 boxes), storage is Netapp and datastore are on nfs

also currently vcenter DB is MSSQLExpress edition, i plan to move this to MSSQL2005 standard edition after upgrading vcenter

I want to upgrade all the boxes to v4.0 U2.

wanted to know the issues faced in upgradation and after that, i am sure many would have done.

Thanks

[AndreTheGiant]

First be sure that all hosts are compatible with 4.0:

http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility

Then migrate the DB to the new SQL Server (you can simple attach the DB files and change the ODBC configuration and restart the vCenter services).

Then upgrade vCenter Server to U2.

Then use Host Update or VUM to upgrade the 3.5 hosts and VUM to update the 4.0 hosts.

Finally upgrade VMware Tools and then (if you need) the virtual hardware.

If you use VCB check also that is the latest version.

Andre

[ashoc123]

Thanks Andre,

i was specifically interested in knowing if anyone had problem during upgradation to v4.0u2

Thanks

[AndreTheGiant]

In all my upgrade, I haven't found specific issues.

In some cases you will not be able to upgrade your ESX hosts (for example if you have a small boot partition), but you can reinstall the host with vSphere and then reconfigure it.

Andre

[PduPreez]

My 2 Cents.

I have done a few upgrades and also have not encountered any issues

Things to think about:

• I would rather go to ver 4.1 than 4.0 U2

• On Virtual Center 3.5 it was recommended to have a physical Virtual Center, but in 4.x a Virtual vCenter machine is recomended

• If the vCenter setup is very basic, i would create a new vCenter VM on a already Upgrade Host

• you need to convert you licenses from 3.5 to 4.0+ (License Server falls away)

• Upgrade can be done online, but post upgrade the new VMTools and Virtual Hardware upgrades will require downtime per VM