Access to ESXi 6.5 and 6.7

[dburkhart85]

First, I have to admit that I am not a VMware expert by any means. I am involved with this product by necessity rather than choice. That is not a derogatory statement against VMware; just stating my knowledge and confidence level.

I have a Cisco VoIP infrastructure that has become out-of-date for various reasons. It runs on ESXi 5.5. In order to update the Cisco software running on it, I need to upgrade from ESXi 5.5 to 6.5 then on up to 6.7 U3. I have become painfully aware that both of these versions of 6 are EOS and EOL, and yet upgrading to 6.7 is needed (as I understand my situation thus far) to get my Cisco software to a current versions. Ultimately, I plan to buy new servers to host the VMware and have all the hardware and software fully current. 

How can I get copies of VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) Offline Bundle versions 6.5 and 6.7 U3? I only need these to transition up to current platform versions. I have no intentions to remain at 6.5 or 6.7 U3 for any length of time. Thank you for any assistance. 

[e_espinel]

Hello.
The first thing would be to know what license has the ESXi 5.5, if the license is free, you can no longer do anything, since those licenses were discontinued (February 2024).

If within the Cisco VOIP solution, you purchased a VMware vsphere license, since it is version 5.5, it is very likely that its support ended long ago.
If you have a VMware connect user and password or VMware customer number, you may be able to find out if you have licenses registered in your company name. You may be able to download the version 6 ISOs, but this only gives you a demo license for 60 days.

You will most likely have to purchase a new VMware vSphere license and check with an authorized VMware vendor to see if you can downgrade to version 7 and then to version 6 (I recommend that you ask for written proof of this).

If the entire infrastructure was provided by Cisco as a solution, you should check with your Cisco reseller, as when changing or upgrading Cisco should provide all the necessary software.

[markey165 · Accepted solution]

@dburkhart85  - If you have an existing VMware license agreement, why not just build a new ESXi 8 host, copy the VM across and power it back on at the other end. It would be far easier and safer. This also gives you a rollback plan, as you can leave the existing server "as is" until you have successfully migrated the VM to the new host.

See a blog post i wrote on how to do this here - https://www.virt-ed.com/post/copying-a-vm-between-esxi-hosts

If you don't have an existing license agreement, and are running on a Free ESXi license, i'm sorry to say that since the Broadcom acquisition, there is no longer a free license option for ESXi. You will need to spend at least $800 on a license for a standalone server with a single socket up to 16 cores, and more if you have multiple sockets and more than 16 cores.

HTH

[dburkhart85]

Thank you for your reply. I really do appreciate you taking your time to do so. Often times when a novice like myself posts such a question in a forum, we get met with snarky responses. I an grateful for your willingness to help. 

The license provided by Cisco was a perpetual license, which I know as of yesterday was completely disregarded by Broadcom (it's good to be King, right?). And, yes, the 5.5 support did die a while back, as well. 

I did speak to a support engineer who works for a reseller for both Cisco and Broadcom/VMware yesterday. Although Cisco TAC does not list it as a supported solution (they want ESXi upgraded from 5.5 to 6.5 to 6.7 U3 before upgrading their server software; then up to current version of ESXi), he said he has turned up new hardware on ESXi 7 and then moved the VMs from the old architecture and powered them on under the new architecture. This sounds much more desirable than the full-on upgrade path. Plus I'll still have my former hardware and VMs to fall back on. This sounds like the winner. 

[dburkhart85]

I manage only the VMs on the Cisco hardware, as I manage all the VoIP infrastructure. The infrastructure director manages the rest of the VM farm, and I know he is in the throws of working out new licensing with Broadcom. That said, I do not know where we stand on that right now, but will be finding out early next week. 

As noted (though subtly) in my post, the official Cisco upgrade path for their software required first upgrading the ESXi, and their supported path for that is 5.5 > 6.0/6.5 > 6.7 U3 > Upgrade Cisco software to current versions > upgrade ESXi to 7 or 8. I learned yesterday that, although not supported by Cisco, I could do as you mentioned (turn up new ESXi architecture and move the servers to it) and was told by a reseller's engineer that this would indeed work. I appreciate the link to the article you wrote on this topic. 

I have over 20 years of work invested in this Cisco software, so I would prefer to upgrade in a supported method. However, as you noted, the new-then-move method still provides a parachute of still having the then-former hardware and VMs available - so I really can't lose by moving forward in this fashion. I see no reason to do anything else in my situation. Once on the new hardware and everything is running, I will upgrade the software on the Cisco VMs.