Upgrade Plan doubt

[shamim-a]

All,

I am planning to upgrade one of the remote site virtual infrastructure. Currently the configuration is

2 VMWare 2.5.3 Hosts (Compaq Proliant, Pentium 3)

2 Datastores (both almost full) - On FC SAN

6 VMs

I have a new hardware to replace 2 old hosts installed with ESX 3.5 Update 2. Datastores will be the same.

Plan:

1. Connect the new server to SAN

2. Shutdown VMs

3. Migrate (Cold migration) vms from old hosts to new hosts (datastores are visible but only readable, so is it possible?)

4. Updrade datastores from vmfs2 to vmfs3 (if i do this prior to step 3, will I be able to migrate VMs, as ESX 2.5.3 cant access VMFS3?)

5. Upgrade VM hardware

6. Upgrade vmware tools.

Please suggest

Shamim

[Texiwill]

Hello,

I have a new hardware to replace 2 old hosts installed with ESX 3.5 Update 2. Datastores will be the same.

Plan:

1. Connect the new server to SAN

2. Shutdown VMs

BACKUP VMs

BACKUP VC1.x Databases

UPDATE VC to VC 2.5

3. Migrate (Cold migration) vms from old hosts to new hosts (datastores are visible but only readable, so is it possible?)

Yes

DISCONNECT 2.5.x SYTEMS from FC-SAN

4. Updrade datastores from vmfs2 to vmfs3 (if i do this prior to step 3, will I be able to migrate VMs, as ESX 2.5.3 cant access VMFS3?)

Do not do this before.

5. Upgrade VM hardware

6. Upgrade vmware tools.

If you add in the suggestions above, you will at least have a safety net in case the VMFS has issues.

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.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[weinstein5]

Do you have Virtual Center? If you do that would be the firstthing I would upgrade - if not you will have to do an inplace upgrade - check this out for detailed information on the upgrade -

If you this or any other naser helpful please xonsider awarding points

[shamim-a]

Hi Texiwell & weinstein5

Thanks for the help

Our main location is running in VI3 (ESX 3.5) infra, so I have VC and already upgraded to 2.5. My Old esx 2.5.3 and new 3.5 hosts are in that VC.

Texiwill,

Thanks for the points on VM Backup

What is the consquence if I didnt disconnect FC SAN before upgrading to VMFS3? because i dont have a person on-site to do that

Let me follow this, will let you the status

Shamim

[Texiwill]

Hello,

There is no major consequence but once you upgrade ESX 2.5.3 will no longer see them and errors may start to appear in the logfiles. You could stop presentation of the LUNs to the 2.5.3 system after migration, no need to physically disconnect.

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.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization