vCenter Server Upgrade

Update 3
VMware vSphere 8.0
vCenter Server 8.0
vCenter Server Upgrade

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https://docs.vmware.com/

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 Contents

1 About vCenter Server Upgrade 7

2 vCenter Server Upgrade Options 8

How to Upgrade vSphere 8
Overview of the vCenter Server Upgrade Process 10
vCenter Server Upgrade Compatibility 12
Differences Between vSphere Upgrades, Patches, Updates, and Migrations 14
Component Behaviour Changes That Affect vCenter Server Upgrade 15
Removal of Platform Services Controller 16
Upgrade or Migration for vCenter Server Instances with an External Platform Services
Controller 16
Upgrading or Migrating to vSphere License Service 17
Upgrading the Trust Authority vCenter Server 17
Support for Upgrading a vCenter Server with Multi-Homing 17
Support for Federal Information Processing Standard 140-2 18
Support for Transport Security Layer 1.3 18
Moving from a Deprecated to a Supported vCenter Server Deployment Topology Before
Upgrade or Migration 18
Example Upgrade Paths from vCenter Server 6.7 to vCenter Server 8.0 19
Example Migration Paths from vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server 8.0 20

3 Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance 22

About the Upgrade Process of the vCenter Server Appliance 24
System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance 25
Hardware Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance 26
Storage Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance 26
Software Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance 27
Required Ports for vCenter Server 27
DNS Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance 28
vSphere Client Software Requirements 28
Preparing to Upgrade the vCenter Server Appliance 29
System Requirements for the vCenter Server Installer 29
Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer 30
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network 31
Transferring Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance 32
Prepare ESXi Hosts for vCenter Server Appliance Upgrade 34
ESXi Host Upgrades and Certificates 35
Change the ESXi Certificate Mode 36

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Determine the Oracle Database Size and the Storage Size for the New Appliance 36
Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Update Manager Machine
39
Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance 39
GUI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance 42
Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0 43
Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 with an Embedded Platform Services Controller or
7.0 by Using the GUI 49
Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance 50
Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server Appliance
With an Embedded Platform Services Controller 54
Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0 with an External Platform Services Controller
Instance by Using the GUI 57
Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance 8.0 58
Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server Appliance
63
Upgrading vCenter Server in High Availability Environments 65
Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments 65
Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 7.0 or 6.7 HA Cluster with an Embedded Platform
Services Controller by Using the GUI 66
Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster 66
Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High Availability Cluster
70
Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 HA Cluster with an External Platform Services
Controller by Using the GUI 71
Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster 72
Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High Availability Cluster
77
CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance 79
Prepare Your JSON Configuration File for CLI Upgrade 79
JSON Templates for CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance 81
About Upgrading a vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller Using
the CLI 82
Upgrade Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of vCenter Server Appliance 84
Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance by Using the CLI 96
Syntax of the CLI Upgrade Command 97
Reduced Downtime Upgrade 99
About the Reduced Downtime Upgrade Process 100
Configure Repository URL 101
Download and Mount the ISO Image 102
Upgrade the vCenter Lifecycle Plug-in 103
Configure the Target vCenter Server Appliance 104
Prepare Upgrade and Switch Over to the Target vCenter Server Appliance 105

4 Migrating vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance 107

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vCenter Server Upgrade

How to Migrate from vCenter Server on Windows to vCenter Server Appliance 107
Migration of Update Manager from Windows to a vCenter Server Appliance 8.0 110
System Requirements for Migrating vCenter Server Deployments to vCenter Server Appliance
Deployments 110
Pre-migration Checks 112
Known Limitations 112
Preparing for Migration 113
Synchronize ESXi Clocks with a Network Time Server 113
Preparing vCenter Server Databases for Migration 114
Prepare an Oracle Database for Migration 115
Prepare a Microsoft SQL Server Database for Migration 116
Prepare PostgreSQL Database Before Migrating vCenter Server to an Appliance 116
Prepare Managed ESXi Hosts for Migration 117
Preparing vCenter Server Certificates for Migration 118
System Requirements for the vCenter Server Installer 119
Determine the Oracle Database Size and the Storage Size for the New Appliance 119
Determine the Microsoft SQL Server Database Size and the Storage Size for the New
vCenter Server Appliance 121
Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine 123
Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server 125
Required Information for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to an Appliance 126
GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an Embedded Platform Services Controller to an vCenter
Server Appliance 131
Deploy the OVA File for Migrating to the Target vCenter Server Appliance 132
Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance 136
GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller to an Appliance
137
Deploy the OVA File for the Target vCenter Server Appliance 139
Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance 143
CLI Migration of a vCenter Server Installation from Windows to an Appliance 144
Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration 145
JSON Templates for CLI Migration of vCenter Server for Windows 147
About Migrating a vCenter Server for Windows with an External Platform Services Controller
Using the CLI 147
Migration Configuration Parameters 150
Run a Pre-Check Before a CLI Migration to vCenter Server Appliance 161
Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from Windows to an Appliance 162
Syntax of the CLI Migrate Command 163

5 After Upgrading or Migrating vCenter Server 166

Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful 167
Log in to Your vCenter Server 168
Decommission the Platform Services Controller 169

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Decommission an External Platform Services Controller Appliance 169

Decommission an External Platform Server Controller for Windows 170
Identity Sources for vCenter Server with vCenter Single Sign-On 172
Reregister Plug-In Solution in vCenter Server After Upgrade or Migration 173
Roll Back a vCenter Server Upgrade or vCenter Server on Windows Migration 174
Monitor and Manage Historical Data Migration 174

6 Managing Software Updates, Upgrades, and Product Compatibility 176

Monitor Interoperability for the Current vCenter Server Version 177
Generate an Interoperability Report for Target vCenter Server Versions 178
Generate Pre-Update Reports 179

7 Patching and Updating vCenter Server 8.0 Deployments 180

Patching vCenter Server 180
Patching vCenter Server Using the vCenter Server Management Interface 181
Automatic Creation of LVM Snapshot 181
Log In to the vCenter Server Management Interface 184
Check for and Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance 184
Configure the Repository for URL-Based Patching 186
Install vCenter Server Patches 187
Enable Automatic Checks for vCenter Server Patches 189
Patching the vCenter Server Appliance by Using the Appliance Shell 189
View a List of All Installed Patches in the vCenter Server Appliance 190
Configure URL-Based Patching 191
Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance 193
Install vCenter Server Patches 194
Patching a vCenter High Availability Environment 196

8 Troubleshooting a vSphere Upgrade 197

Collect Installation Logs for vCenter Server Appliance 197
Errors and Warnings Returned by the Installation and Upgrade Precheck Script 198
Upgrade Issues with vCenter Server Containing Host Profiles 201
Roll Back a vCenter Server Instance on Windows When vCenter Server Upgrade Fails 201
Collect Logs to Troubleshoot ESXi Hosts 202

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About vCenter Server Upgrade
1
vCenter Server Upgrade describes how to upgrade VMware vCenter Server™ to the current
version.

At VMware, we value inclusion. To foster this principle within our customer, partner, and internal
community, we create content using inclusive language.

Intended Audience
vCenter Server Upgrade is for anyone who must upgrade from earlier versions of vSphere. These
topics are for experienced Microsoft Windows or Linux system administrators who are familiar
with virtual machine technology and data center operations.

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vCenter Server Upgrade Options
2
vCenter Server 8.0 provides many options for upgrading your vCenter Server deployment. For a
successful vCenter Server upgrade, you must understand the upgrade options, the configuration
details that impact the upgrade process, and the sequence of tasks.

The two core components of vSphere are VMware ESXi™ and VMware vCenter Server™. ESXi
is the virtualization platform on which you can create and run virtual machines and virtual
appliances. vCenter Server is a management plane that acts as a central administrator for
ESXi hosts connected in a network. You use the vCenter Server system to pool and manage
the resources of multiple hosts. vCenter Server appliance is a preconfigured virtual machine
optimized to run vCenter Server.

You can upgrade existing vCenter Server deployments that include either an embedded or an
external Platform Services Controller to a deployment consisting of a vCenter Server appliance.

Read the following topics next:

n How to Upgrade vSphere

n Differences Between vSphere Upgrades, Patches, Updates, and Migrations

n Component Behaviour Changes That Affect vCenter Server Upgrade

n Moving from a Deprecated to a Supported vCenter Server Deployment Topology Before

Upgrade or Migration

n Example Upgrade Paths from vCenter Server 6.7 to vCenter Server 8.0

n Example Migration Paths from vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server 8.0

How to Upgrade vSphere

vSphere is a sophisticated product with multiple components to upgrade. Understanding the
required sequence of tasks is vital for a successful vSphere upgrade.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Figure 2-1. Overview of vSphere Upgrade Tasks

Start vSphere upgrade

Back up your configuration

Upgrade vCenter Server

Upgrade ESXi hosts

Upgrade virtual machines

Upgrade to vSphere 8.0 complete

Upgrading vSphere includes the following tasks:

1 Read the vSphere release notes.

2 Verify that you have backed up your configuration.

3 If your vSphere system includes VMware solutions or plug-ins, verify that they are compatible
with the vCenter Server appliance version to which you are upgrading. See VMware
Product Interoperability Matrix at http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/sim/
interop_matrix.php.

4 Upgrade vCenter Server.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

See Overview of the vCenter Server Upgrade Process.

5 To ensure sufficient disk storage for log files, consider setting up a syslog server for remote
logging. Setting up logging on a remote host is especially important for hosts with a limited
amount of local storage.

For detailed instructions, see ESXi Upgrade.

6 Upgrade your VMs manually or by using vSphere Lifecycle Manager to perform an

orchestrated upgrade.

For detailed instructions, see Installing and Administering VMware vSphere Update Manager.

When you upgrade vSphere, you must perform all procedures in the specified sequence to avoid
possible data loss and to minimize downtime. You can perform the upgrade process for each
component in only one direction. For example, after you upgrade to vCenter Server 8.0, you
cannot revert to vCenter Server 7.0 or 6.7. With backups and some planning, however, you can
restore your original vCenter Server environment.

Overview of the vCenter Server Upgrade Process

VMware provides many options to upgrade to vCenter Server 8.0.

You can upgrade or migrate your vCenter Server version 6.7 or version 7.0 installation to version
8.0 .

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Figure 2-2. Overview of vCenter Server Upgrade Tasks

Start vCenter Server upgrade

Verify you meet the

upgrade requirements

Prepare the
upgrade environment

Choose
your
upgrade
method

Migrate vCenter Server

Upgrade vCenter
on Windows to vCenter
Server Appliance
Server Appliance

Complete post-upgrade
tasks

Upgrade is complete

High-level steps for upgrading or migrating vCenter Server:

1 Select your upgrade goal.

n Chapter 3 Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance

n Chapter 4 Migrating vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance

2 Verify that your system meets the hardware and software requirements. See System
Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.

3 Prepare your environment for the upgrade or migration.

4 Upgrade or migrate your vCenter Server for Windows or vCenter Server appliance
deployment.

5 Finish any required post-upgrade or post-migration tasks.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Concurrent upgrades are not supported and upgrade order matters. For information on the order
in which to upgrade transitional environments, see Example Upgrade Paths from vCenter Server
6.7 to vCenter Server 8.0 .

vCenter Server Supported Upgrade Methods

Graphical User Interface (GUI) Installer

The GUI installer provides a two-step upgrade method using an OVA file that you deploy,
and the vCenter Server appliance Management GUI. The first step deploys vCenter Server
appliance as an OVA file. The second step uses the vCenter Server Management GUI to
configure the new appliance using the source deployment data.

Command Line Interface (CLI) Installer

The CLI installer provides advanced users with a CLI method for upgrading the vCenter
Server appliance or migrating vCenter Server for Windows to an appliance. You can upgrade
or migrate to a vCenter Server appliance using customized CLI templates.

Migration Assistant Interface for Migrating vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server
appliance

When you migrate a legacy Platform Services Controller or vCenter Server for Windows to an
appliance using the Migration Assistant interface. You can use either the GUI method or the
CLI method to migrate the legacy Windows installation data to a target appliance. See How
to Migrate from vCenter Server on Windows to vCenter Server Appliance.

Deprecated vCenter Server Deployment Models

When upgrading or migrating from deprecated deployment models, you must first migrate
your deployment to a currently supported deployment model before attempting to upgrade
or migrate it to a vCenter Server 8.0 deployment. For more information, see Moving from
a Deprecated to a Supported vCenter Server Deployment Topology Before Upgrade or
Migration

Patching and Updating vCenter Server

A patch or update brings the vCenter Server 8.0 software up to the current, minor version.
You can use the patching process to make minor upgrades to your 8.0 deployment. See
Differences Between vSphere Upgrades, Patches, Updates, and Migrations and Chapter 7
Patching and Updating vCenter Server 8.0 Deployments.

vCenter Server Upgrade Compatibility

Upgrading to vCenter Server 8.0 affects other software components of the data center.

Table 2-1. Upgrading vCenter Server and Related VMware Products and Components summarizes
how upgrading vCenter Server can affect your data center components.

vCenter Server 8.0 can manage ESXi version 6.7 hosts in the same cluster with ESXi 8.0 hosts.
vCenter Server 8.0 cannot manage ESXi 6.5 or earlier hosts.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

vSphere supports upgrades from vCenter Server 6.7 and later to vCenter Server 8.0. To upgrade
from vCenter Server 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, 6.0, or 6.5 you must first upgrade the vCenter Server instance
to version 6.7 or later releases, and then upgrade to vCenter Server 8.0. For information about
upgrading vCenter Server 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, 6.0, or 6.5 to version 6.7 or 7.0, see the VMware vSphere
6.7 Documentation or VMware vSphere 7.0 Documentation.
Table 2-1. Upgrading vCenter Server and Related VMware Products and Components

Product or Component Compatibility

vCenter Server Verify support for the upgrade path from your current version of vCenter Server
to your planned upgrade version. See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix at
http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/sim/interop_matrix.php.

ESX and ESXi hosts Verify that your ESX or ESXi host works with the vCenter Server version that you are
upgrading to. vCenter Server 8.0 requires ESXi host version 6.7 or later. Upgrade if
necessary. See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix at http://www.vmware.com/
resources/compatibility/sim/interop_matrix.php.

VMware Host Profiles Host Profiles is a vCenter Server tool for designing and deploying ESX and ESXi hosts.
Ensure that you are using Host Profiles version 6.0 or later. See Knowledge Base article
KB 52932.
For more information on upgrade problems related to Host Profiles, see Upgrade Issues
with vCenter Server Containing Host Profiles and the sections on Host Profiles upgrade
workflows in the vSphere Host Profiles documentation.

VMFS volumes You cannot upgrade a VMFS5 datastore to VMFS6. If you have a VMFS5 datastore
in your environment, create a VMFS6 datastore and migrate virtual machines from
the VMFS5 datastore to VMFS6. For more information on VMFS datastores, see the
vSphere Storage documentation.

Virtual machines Upgrade options depend on your current version. See the information about upgrading
virtual machines in the ESXi Upgrade documentation.

VMware Tools Upgrade options depend on your current version. See the information about upgrading
VMware Tools in the ESXi Upgrade documentation.

Auto Deploy To ensure compatibility and best performance, when you upgrade to vCenter Server
8.0, use Auto Deploy to upgrade ESXi hosts to the same version.

vSphere Distributed Virtual You must upgrade to DVS version 6.6 or later before you upgrade to vCenter Server
Switch (DVS) 8.0. See Knowledge Base article KB 52826.

vSphere Network I/O DVS version 6.0 or later supports only Network I/O Control version 3. If you are using
Control an earlier version of Network I/O Control you must upgrade to Network I/O Control
version 3. For more information, see the vSphere Networking documentation.

vSAN To avoid potential faults because of differences in the vSAN support in vCenter Server
and ESXi, synchronize versions of vCenter Server and ESXi. For the best integration
between vSAN components on vCenter Server and ESXi, deploy the latest version
of these two vSphere components. For more information, see the ESXi Installation
and Setup, vCenter Server Installation and Setup, ESXi Upgrade, and vCenter Server
Upgrade documentation.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 2-1. Upgrading vCenter Server and Related VMware Products and Components
(continued)

Product or Component Compatibility

vSAN disk version vSAN has several different on-disk format versions available depending on the version
and upgrade history of the cluster. Some on-disk format versions are transient while
others are intended for long-term production. As certain vSAN features are tied to the
on-disk format version, the format version must be accounted for when determining
interoperability. See Knowledge Base article KB 2148493.

Legacy Fault Tolerance If the vCenter Server inventory contains a VM on which legacy VMware Fault Tolerance
(FT) is in use, upgrade or migration will be blocked until you turn off this feature. For
information about legacy FT, see Knowledge Base article KB 2143127. For information
on disabling or turning off FT, see Knowledge Base article KB 1008026.

Differences Between vSphere Upgrades, Patches, Updates,

and Migrations
vSphere products distinguish between upgrades, which make major changes to the software,
patches and updates, which make smaller changes to the software, and migrations, which make
changes to the software platform.

VMware product versions are numbered with two digits, for example, vSphere 8.0. A release that
changes either digit, for example, from 6.5 to 6.7, or from 6.7 to 7.0, involves major changes
in the software, and requires an upgrade from the previous version. A release that makes a
smaller change, requiring only a patch or update, is indicated by an update number, for example,
vSphere 6.7 Update 1.

For information about upgrading vCenter Server installations, see Chapter 3 Upgrading the
vCenter Server Appliance .

For information about patching or updating vCenter Server, see Chapter 7 Patching and
Updating vCenter Server 8.0 Deployments

When you upgrade an ESXi host, some host configuration information is preserved in the
upgraded version, and the upgraded host, after rebooting, can join a vCenter Server instance
that has been upgraded to the same level. Because updates and patches do not involve major
changes to the software, host configuration is not affected. For more information, see the ESXi
Upgrade documentation.
When you upgrade a vCenter Server for Windows instance and convert it to a vCenter Server
appliance instance, it is a migration.

For information about migrating a vCenter Server installation to a, see Chapter 4 Migrating
vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance .

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Component Behaviour Changes That Affect vCenter Server

Upgrade
When upgrading to vCenter Server 8.0, it is important to understand changes in component
behavior for version 8.0 that can affect the upgrade process.

Understanding changes from previous versions of vSphere can help in your upgrade planning.
For a complete list of new features in vSphere 8.0, see the Release Notes for version 8.0
releases.

Upgrade Methods
There are multiple methods for upgrading vCenter Server to version 8.0.

Supported Migration Path from vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server

You can migrate from an existing vCenter Server for Windows to a vCenter Server 8.0
deployment using a graphical user interface-based installer or a command-line interface-
based installer. See Chapter 4 Migrating vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance .

Support for Graphical User Interface (GUI) Deployments of vCenter Server

You can upgrade an existing vCenter Server appliance version 6.7 or 7.0 deployment to
vCenter Server 8.0 using the GUI. See GUI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance.

Support for Command Line Interface (CLI) Deployments of vCenter Server Appliance

You can upgrade an existing vCenter Server appliance version 6.7 or 7.0 deployment to
vCenter Server 8.0 using the CLI. See CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance .

Support for Reduced Downtime Upgrade through vSphere Client

You can use a migration-based approach to upgrade vCenter Server between major and
minor versions that reduces downtime to several minutes. See Reduced Downtime Upgrade.

Changes in Supported Deployment Types

Changes from previous versions of vSphere can affect your deployment type.

Mixed IPv4 and IPv6 Upgrade and Migration

n Upgrade and migration from vCenter Server 6.7 or 7.0 to 8.0 is supported for pure IPv4 or
pure IPv6 management networks only.

n Using dual IP stacks (IPv4 and IPv6) is not supported.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Removal of Platform Services Controller

Beginning in vSphere 7.0, deploying or upgrading vCenter Server in vSphere 7.0 requires the
use of vCenter Server appliance, a preconfigured virtual machine optimized for running vCenter
Server.

The new vCenter Server contains all Platform Services Controller services, preserving the
functionality and workflows, including authentication, certificate management, and licensing. It
is no longer necessary nor possible to deploy and use an external Platform Services Controller.
All Platform Services Controller services are consolidated into vCenter Server, and deployment
and administration are simplified.

As these services are now part of vCenter Server, they are no longer described as a part of
Platform Services Controller. In vSphere 7.0, the vSphere Authentication publication replaces the
Platform Services Controller Administration publication. The new publication contains complete
information about authentication and certificate management.

Upgrade or Migration for vCenter Server Instances with an External

Platform Services Controller
When you upgrade or migrate a vCenter Server deployment using an external Platform Services
Controller, you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded
Platform Services Controller and then perform the upgrade or migration.

When you converge the Platform Services Controller into a vCenter Server appliance, you must
identify the management node to use for your deployment's vSphere SSO domain. In domains
with multiple vCenter Server instances, you must specify the SSO replication partner to use for
each subsequent vCenter Server.

The method you use to upgrade or migrate determines how you specify the management node
to use for your deployment's vSphere SSO domain.

n If you upgrade or migrate using the GUI-based installer, the Upgrade wizard prompts you to
specify the replication topology for the vCenter Server deployment.

To learn about upgrading using the GUI-based installer, see Upgrade a vCenter Server
Appliance 6.7 or 7.0 with an External Platform Services Controller Instance by Using the GUI.
To learn about migrating using the GUI-based installer, see GUI Migration of vCenter Server
with an External Platform Services Controller to an Appliance.

n If you upgrade or migrate using the CLI-based installer, you specify the replication topology
for the vCenter Server deployment using the JSON templates. The JSON files contain the
configuration parameters and their values for your upgrade or migration specification.

To learn about upgrading using the CLI-based installer, see About Upgrading a vCenter
Server with an External Platform Services Controller Using the CLI. To learn about migrating
using the CLI-based installer, see About Migrating a vCenter Server for Windows with an
External Platform Services Controller Using the CLI.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

n You can use a migration-based approach to upgrade vCenter Server between major versions
that reduces downtime to several minutes. See Reduced Downtime Upgrade.

When the upgrade or migration process finishes, the newly deployed vCenter Server
8.0 appliance incorporates the former Platform Services Controller services. You can then
decommission the external Platform Services Controller in your environment. See Decommission
the Platform Services Controller.

To learn more about converging a vCenter Server deployment using an external Platform
Services Controller into a vCenter Server appliance, see Knowledge Base article KB 68137.

Upgrading or Migrating to vSphere License Service

The License Service provides common license inventory and management capabilities to the
vCenter Server systems. When upgrading or migrating your vCenter Server deployment,
licensing data is transferred to the License Service in the vCenter Server appliance.

When upgrading vCenter Server versions 6.7 or 7.0 that are connected to a Platform Services
Controller, their licensing data is transferred to the License Service in the vCenter Server
appliance. The licensing data includes the available licenses and license assignments for hosts,
vCenter Server systems, vSAN clusters, and other products that you use with vSphere.

After the upgrade or migration of the vCenter Server systems finishes, the License Services
stores the available licenses and manages the license assignments for the entire vSphere
environment.

For more information about the License Service and managing licenses in vSphere, see vCenter
Server and Host Management.

Upgrading the Trust Authority vCenter Server

Upgrade the Trust Authority vCenter Server and Trust Authority Hosts.

Starting with vSphere 8.0, you can take advantage of VMware® vSphere Trust Authority™.
vSphere Trust Authority is a foundational technology that enhances workload security. vSphere
Trust Authority establishes a greater level of trust in your organization by associating an ESXi
host's hardware root of trust to the workload itself.

The best practice for upgrading a vSphere Trust Authority infrastructure is to upgrade the
Trust Authority vCenter Server and Trust Authority Hosts first. In this way, you get the most
benefit from the latest vSphere Trust Authority features. However, you can perform separate,
standalone upgrades of vCenter Server and ESXi hosts to fit specific business reasons. To learn
about upgrading the Trust Authority Cluster vCenter Server see "vSphere Trust Authority Life
Cycle" in the vSphere Security guide.

Support for Upgrading a vCenter Server with Multi-Homing

When upgrading a vCenter Server appliance with two or more network interface cards (NICs),
the upgrade transfers the IP addresses from each network interface from the source vCenter
Server to the target vCenter Server.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

During the upgrade process, the Upgrade installer performs a pre-check of the source vCenter
Server and records the network settings. When this information is transferred to the target
vCenter Server appliance, the network settings are transferred as part of the configuration. When
the upgrade process finishes, you can log in to the vCenter Server appliance using the vSphere
ClientvSphere Client, and verify that the IP addresses have been successfully transferred to the
newly upgraded vCenter Server appliance.

With two or more NICs per vCenter Server appliance, you can better manage network traffic in
your environment. For example, with multiple network interfaces you can:

n Configure backup traffic to use a different network than management traffic.

n Keep ESXi hosts on a physically different LAN segment from your management traffic. You
can connect one network interface to the network with your ESXi hosts, and connect the
other to a network from which administrative clients connect to vCenter Server.

Support for Federal Information Processing Standard 140-2

vCenter Server 8.0 supports Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2.

FIPS 140-2 is a U.S. and Canadian government standard that specifies security requirements for
cryptographic modules. By default, FIPS 140-2 is always activated after installation or upgrade of
vCenter Server 8.0.

To learn more about support for FIPS 140-2 in VMware products, see https://www.vmware.com/
security/certifications/fips.html.

To learn how to activate or deactivate FIPS 140-2 support, see the vSphere Security
documentation.

Support for Transport Security Layer 1.3

Starting in 8.0 Update 3, vSphere supports TLS 1.3 and 1.2 through the use of TLS profiles. By
default, vSphere supports the Transport Security Layer (TLS) 1.3 encryption protocol.

Upgrading to vSphere 8.0 Update 3 activates the default TLS profile, named COMPATIBLE, on
ESXi and vCenter Server hosts. The COMPATIBLE profile supports TLS 1.3 and some TLS 1.2
connections.

To learn how to manage TLS configuration, see the vSphere Security guide.

Moving from a Deprecated to a Supported vCenter Server

Deployment Topology Before Upgrade or Migration
Before you upgrade or migrate your environment to vSphere 8.0, you must move any
deprecated deployment topology to a supported deployment topology.

When you first install vCenter Server 6.7, your deployment includes either an embedded Platform
Services Controller or an external Platform Services Controller.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

The installer does not validate whether the Platform Services Controller is external or embedded
with vCenter Server. Although many types of join operations are possible, not all resulting
topologies are supported. Before you upgrade or migrate your environment to vSphere 8.0,
you must move any deprecated deployment topology to a supported deployment topology.

Moving to a Supported Topology from a vCenter Server Pointing to

an Embedded Platform Services Controller
Figure 2-3. Deprecated topology of a vCenter Server Pointing to an Embedded Platform
Services Controller

Virtual Machine Virtual Machine

or Physical Server or Physical Server

Platform Services
vCenter Server
Controller

vCenter Server

Moving to a Supported Topology from an Embedded Platform

Services Controller and an External Platform Services Controller in
Replication
Figure 2-4. Deprecated Topology of an Embedded Platform Services Controller and an External
Platform Services Controller in Replication

Virtual Machine or Virtual Machine

Physical Server or Physical Server

Platform Services Platform Services

Controller Controller

vCenter Server

Virtual Machine Virtual Machine

or Physical Server or Physical Server

vCenter Server vCenter Server

Example Upgrade Paths from vCenter Server 6.7 to vCenter

Server 8.0
vCenter Server 6.7 deployment upgrade to 8.0.

The vCenter Server example upgrade paths demonstrate vCenter Server 6.7 upgrade outcomes.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

The installer upgrades vCenter Server 6.7 with an embedded Platform Services Controller
instance to vCenter Server 8.0.

Figure 2-5. vCenter Server 6.7 with Embedded Platform Services Controller Before and After
Upgrade

vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server 8.0

vCenter Server

Upgrade vCenter Server

Platform Services Controller

Appliance

Windows OS

Before upgrading a vCenter Server deployment with an external Platform Services Controller,
you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded Platform
Services Controller and then perform the upgrade.

Figure 2-6. vCenter Server 6.7 with External Platform Services Controller Before and After
Upgrade
vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server 8.0

vCenter Server
Operating System
Converge Upgrade vCenter Server

Platform Services Controller

Platform Services Controller Appliance

Operating System

Operating System

Example Migration Paths from vCenter Server for Windows

to vCenter Server 8.0
You can migrate a vCenter Server for Windows instance to a vCenter Server 8.0 instance.

You can migrate a vCenter Server for Windows version 6.7 to a vCenter Server 8.0 appliance.

The vCenter Server example migration paths demonstrate supported migration outcomes.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

You can migrate a vCenter Server 6.7 instance with an embedded Platform Services Controller to
a 8.0. In this case the software migrates the vCenter Server instance and the embedded Platform
Services Controller instance at the same time.

Figure 2-7. vCenter Server 6.7 with Embedded Platform Services Controller Installation Before
and After Migration

vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server 8.0

vCenter Server

Migrate vCenter Server

Platform Services Controller

Appliance

Windows OS

Figure 2-8. vCenter Server 6.7 with External Platform Services Controller Installation Before and
After Migration

vCenter Server 6.7

Platform Services vCenter Server 6.7

Controller
vCenter Server 8.0
vCenter Server
Windows OS Converge Migrate
vCenter Server
Platform Services
Controller

Appliance
vCenter Server
Windows OS

Windows OS

Before migrating a vCenter Server 6.5 or 6.7 instance with an external Platform Services
Controller, you must converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded
Platform Services Controller and then migrate to vCenter Server 8.0.

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Upgrading the vCenter Server
Appliance 3
You can upgrade vCenter Server appliance 7.0 or 6.7 to version 8.0. All the installation files
that are necessary for the upgrade are included in the vCenter Server installer, which you can
download from the VMware website.

The upgrade of the vCenter Server appliance is a migration of the old version to the new version,
which includes deploying a new vCenter Server appliance of version 8.0. You can deploy the
new appliance on an ESXi host 6.7or later, or on the inventory of a vCenter Server instance 6.7
or later. You assign a temporary IP address to the new appliance to facilitate the configuration
and services data migration from the old appliance to the newly deployed appliance. After the
migration, the IP address and host name of the old appliance are applied to the new upgraded
appliance of version 8.0. At the end of the upgrade, the temporary IP address is released and the
old appliance is powered off.

Version 8.0 of vCenter Server uses an embedded PostgreSQL database. During the upgrade,
you must select a storage size for the new appliance that is suitable for the database size.

vCenter Server 8.0 uses an embedded vSphere Lifecycle Manager service that allows you to
perform centralized and simplified lifecycle management of clusters with ESXi 7.0 hosts. vSphere
Lifecycle Manager in vSphere 8.0 includes the functionality that Update Manager provided in
earlier vSphere releases for host upgrade and patching operations, and upgrade of virtual
machine hardware and VMware Tools.

If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance or migrating a vCenter Server that use an
external Update Manager instance that runs on Windows, in vSphere 8.0 the external Update
Manager instance is migrated to the embedded vSphere Lifecycle Manager extension service of
the new, upgraded vCenter Server appliance.

If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses an embedded VMware Update
Manager instance, in vSphere 7.0 the embedded VMware Update Manager instance is upgraded
to the embedded vSphere Lifecycle Manager extension service of the new upgraded vCenter
Server appliance. The embedded VMware vSphere Update Manager Extension uses the
embedded PostgreSQL database. Before the upgrade, you must run the Migration Assistant on
the source Update Manager instance.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

For information about the software included in the vCenter Server 8.0, see vCenter Server
Installation and Setup.

Note vCenter Server deployments using an external Platform Services Controller will not be
supported in a future vSphere release. For more information, see Decommission the Platform
Services Controller and Knowledge Base article KB 60229. For topologies with external Platform
Services Controller instances, you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to
an embedded Platform Services Controller and then perform the upgrade. To learn more about
converging a vCenter Server deployment using an external Platform Services Controller into a
vCenter Server appliance, see Knowledge Base article KB 68137. After a successful upgrade,
the external Platform Services Controller is powered off can be removed from your vSphere
inventory.

The vCenter Server installer contains executable files for both GUI and CLI upgrades which you
can use alternatively.

n The GUI upgrade is a two stage process. The first stage is a Deployment wizard that deploys
the OVA file of the new appliance on the target ESXi host or vCenter Server instance. After
the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to the second stage of the process that
sets up and transfers the services and configuration data from the old appliance to the newly
deployed appliance.

n The CLI upgrade method involves running a CLI command against a JSON file that you
previously prepared. The CLI installer parses the configuration parameters and their values
from the JSON file and generates an OVF Tool command that deploys the new appliance.
The OVF Tool command also transfers services and configuration data and from the old
appliance to the new appliance.

For information about the vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller appliance upgrade
requirements, see System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.

Important If the appliance that you are upgrading is configured in a mixed IPv4 and IPv6
environment, only the IPv4 settings are preserved. For information on the transfer of networking
configuration settings for mixed mode IPv4 and IPv6 deployments, see Mixed IPv4 and IPv6
Upgrade and Migration.

If you are deploying the vCenter Server appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral
distributed virtual port groups are not supported and are not shown. After the upgrade, you can
manually connect the appliance to the original non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group. This
is not a limitation when deploying the appliance through a vCenter Server, and you can deploy to
ephemeral or non-ephemeral distributed virtual port groups.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

To upgrade vCenter Server appliance version 6.5or earlier, you must first upgrade to version
6.7 or 7.0and then upgrade to version 8.0. For information about upgrading vCenter Server
appliance 6.5 to version 6.7, see the VMware vSphere 6.7 documentation. For information
about upgrading vCenter Server appliance 6.5 to version 7.0, see the VMware vSphere 7.0
documentation. For information on the upgrade compatibility of vCenter Server, see the VMware
Compatibility Guide.

For information about deploying the vCenter Server, see vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

For information about configuring the vCenter Server, see vCenter Server Configuration.

Read the following topics next:

n About the Upgrade Process of the vCenter Server Appliance

n System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance

n Preparing to Upgrade the vCenter Server Appliance

n Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance

n GUI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance

n Upgrading vCenter Server in High Availability Environments

n CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance

n Reduced Downtime Upgrade

About the Upgrade Process of the vCenter Server Appliance

You can upgrade the vCenter Server appliance from version 6.7 or 7.0 to version 8.0.

Important If your current vCenter Server appliance is version 6.5 or earlier, you must upgrade to
version 6.7 or 7.0 before upgrading to version 8.0.

Important In environments with multiple instances of vCenter Server appliance, you cannot
perform parallel upgrades. Each vCenter Server instance must be upgraded separately. The
reason for this is that VMware Directory Services (vmdird) encounters replication problems with
single-sign on and certificate information.

When you run the GUI or CLI upgrade, the process includes:

1 Deploying a new vCenter Server 8.0 with a temporary network configuration.

If you are upgrading a vCenter Server, you must select a deployment size for the new
appliance that is suitable for your vSphere environment size. You must also select a storage
size for the new appliance that is suitable for the vCenter Server database. If the source
vCenter Server uses an external database, see Determine the Oracle Database Size and the
Storage Size for the New Appliance.

2 Exporting the services and configuration data from the source appliance of version 6.7 or 7.0
that you want to upgrade.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

You must select the data types that you want to transfer to the new appliance.

If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses an external Update Manager
instance, you must ensure that the Migration Assistant is running on the Update Manager
computer. Migration Assistant facilitates the export of the Update Manager configuration and
database.

3 Transferring the exported data to the newly deployed appliance

If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are not supported and do not appear as options during the upgrade. After the
upgrade, you can manually connect the appliance to the original non-ephemeral distributed
virtual port group. This process is not a limitation when deploying the appliance through a
vCenter Server, and you can deploy to ephemeral or non-ephemeral distributed virtual port
groups.

If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses a Update Manager instance, the
Update Manager instance is migrated to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager of the new upgraded
appliance. To learn more about vSphere Lifecycle Manager, see the Managing Host and
Cluster Lifecycle documentation.
4 If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses an external Platform Services
Controller, it is converted to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the
appliance.

The new vCenter Server appliance contains all Platform Services Controller services,
preserving the functionality and workflows, including authentication, certificate management,
and licensing. It is no longer necessary nor possible to deploy and use an external Platform
Services Controller. All Platform Services Controller services are consolidated into vCenter
Server during the upgrade.

5 Powering off the source appliance. The new upgraded vCenter Server appliance assumes the
network configuration of the source appliance.

n For the new appliance requirements, see System Requirements for the New vCenter Server
Appliance.

n For the appliance upgrade preparation, see Preparing to Upgrade the vCenter Server
Appliance .

n For the appliance upgrade procedures, see Chapter 3 Upgrading the vCenter Server
Appliance .

n For the appliance post-upgrade procedures, see Chapter 5 After Upgrading or Migrating
vCenter Server.

System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance

The upgrade of the appliance is a migration of the old version to the new version, which includes
deploying a new appliance of version 8.0. You can deploy the new vCenter Server appliance on

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vCenter Server Upgrade

an ESXi host 6.7 or later, or on a vCenter Server instance 6.7 or later. Your system must also
meet specific software and hardware requirements.

When you use Fully Qualified Domain Names, verify that the client machine from which you are
deploying the appliance and the network on which you are deploying the appliance use the same
DNS server.

Before you deploy the new appliance, synchronize the clocks of the target server and all vCenter
Server instances on the vSphere network. Unsynchronized clocks might result in authentication
problems and can cause the installation to fail or prevent the appliance services from starting.
See Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.

Hardware Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance

When you deploy the vCenter Server appliance, you can select to deploy an appliance that is
suitable for the size of your vSphere environment. The option that you select determines the
number of CPUs and the amount of memory for the appliance.

The hardware requirements for a vCenter Server appliance depend on the size of your vSphere
inventory.

Number of vCPUs Memory

Tiny environment (up to 10 hosts or 2 14 GB

100 virtual machines)

Small environment (up to 100 hosts or 4 21 GB

1,000 virtual machines)

Medium environment (up to 400 8 30 GB

hosts or 4,000 virtual machine)

Large environment (up to 1,000 hosts 16 39 GB

or 10,000 virtual machines)

X-Large environment (up to 2,000 24 58 GB

hosts or 35,000 virtual machines)

Note If you want to add an ESXi host with more than 512 LUNs and 2,048 paths to the vCenter
Server inventory, you must deploy a vCenter Server appliance for a large or x-large environment.

Storage Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance

When you deploy the vCenter Server appliance, the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you
deploy the appliance must meet minimum storage requirements. The required storage depends
not only on the size of the vSphere environment and the storage size, but also on the disk
provisioning mode.

The storage requirements are different for each vSphere environment size and depend on your
database size requirements.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Default Storage Size Large Storage Size X-Large Storage Size

Tiny environment (up to 579 GB 2019 GB 4279 GB

10 hosts or 100 virtual
machines)

Small environment (up to 694 GB 2044 GB 4304 GB

100 hosts or 1,000 virtual
machines)

Medium environment (up to 908 GB 2208 GB 4468 GB

400 hosts or 4,000 virtual
machine)

Large environment (up to 1358 GB 2258 GB 4518 GB

1,000 hosts or 10,000
virtual machines)

X-Large environment (up 2283 GB 2383 GB 4643 GB

to 2,000 hosts or 35,000
virtual machines)

Note The storage requirements include the requirements for the vSphere Lifecycle Manager
that runs as a service in the vCenter Server appliance.

Software Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance

The VMware vCenter Server appliance can be deployed on ESXi 6.7 hosts or later, or on vCenter
Server instances 6.7 or later.

You can deploy the vCenter Server appliance using the GUI or CLI installer. You run the installer
from a network client machine that you use to connect to the target server and deploy the
appliance on the server. You can connect directly to an ESXi 6.7 host on which to deploy the
appliance. You can also connect to a vCenter Server 6.7 instance to deploy the appliance on an
ESXi host or DRS cluster that resides in the vCenter Server inventory.

For information about the requirements for network client machine, see System Requirements for
the vCenter Server Installer.

Required Ports for vCenter Server

The vCenter Server system must be able to send data to every managed host and receive
data from the vSphere Client. To enable migration and provisioning activities between managed
hosts, the source and destination hosts must be able to receive data from each other through
predetermined TCP and UDP ports.

vCenter Server is accessed through predetermined TCP and UDP ports. If you manage network
components from outside a firewall, you might be required to reconfigure the firewall to allow
access on the appropriate ports. For the list of all supported ports and protocols in vSphere, see
the VMware Ports and Protocols Tool™ at https://ports.vmware.com.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

During installation, if a port is in use or is blocked using a denylist, the vCenter Server installer
displays an error message. You must use another port number to proceed with the installation.
There are internal ports that are used only for inter-process communication.

VMware uses designated ports for communication. Additionally, the managed hosts monitor
designated ports for data from vCenter Server. If a built-in firewall exists between any of
these elements, the installer opens the ports during the installation or upgrade process. For
custom firewalls, you must manually open the required ports. If you have a firewall between two
managed hosts and you want to perform source or target activities, such as migration or cloning,
you must configure a means for the managed hosts to receive data.

To configure the vCenter Server system to use a different port to receive vSphere Client data,
see the vCenter Server and Host Management documentation.

DNS Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance

When you deploy the new vCenter Server appliance, in the temporary network settings, you can
assign a static IP address and an FQDN that is resolvable by a DNS server. After the upgrade, the
appliance frees this static IP address and assumes the network settings of the old appliance.

When you deploy the vCenter Server appliance with a static IP address, you ensure that in case
of system restart, the IP address of the appliance remains the same.

Before you deploy the vCenter Server appliance with a static IP address, you must verify that this
IP address has a valid internal domain name system (DNS) registration.

When you deploy the vCenter Server appliance, the installation of the web server component
that supports the vSphere Client fails if the installer cannot look up the fully qualified domain
name (FQDN) for the appliance from its IP address. Reverse lookup is implemented using PTR
records.

If you plan to use an FQDN for the appliance system name, you must verify that the FQDN is
resolvable by a DNS server, by adding forward and reverse DNS A records.

You can use the nslookup command to verify that the DNS reverse lookup service returns an
FQDN when queried with the IP address and to verify that the FQDN is resolvable.

nslookup -nosearch -nodefname FQDN_or_IP_address

If you use DHCP instead of a static IP address for the vCenter Server appliance, verify that the
appliance name is updated in the domain name service (DNS). If you can ping the appliance
name, the name is updated in DNS.

Ensure that the ESXi host management interface has a valid DNS resolution from the vCenter
Server and all vSphere Client instances. Ensure that the vCenter Server has a valid DNS resolution
from all ESXi hosts and vSphere Client.

vSphere Client Software Requirements

Use of the vSphere Client requires a supported web browser.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

VMware has tested and supports the following guest operating systems and browser versions
for the vSphere Client.

Supported Guest Operating Systems

n Windows 32-bit and 64-bit

n Mac OS

Supported Browser Versions

n Google Chrome 90 or later

n Mozilla Firefox 80 or later

n Microsoft Edge 89 or later

Note Later versions of these browsers are likely to work, but have not been tested.

Preparing to Upgrade the vCenter Server Appliance

Before you upgrade the vCenter Server appliance, you must download the vCenter Server
installer ISO file and mount it to a network virtual machine or physical server from which you
want to perform the upgrade.

The computer from which you upgrade the appliance must run on a Windows, Linux, or Mac
operating system that meets the operating system requirements. See System Requirements for
the vCenter Server Installer.

Before upgrading a vCenter Server appliance, you must prepare the ESXi hosts in the inventory.

Before upgrading a vCenter Server deployment using an external Platform Services Controller,
you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded Platform
Services Controller and then perform the upgrade. See Knowledge Base article KB 68137.

If the vCenter Server appliance uses an external Oracle database, you must determine the size of
the existing database.

If vCenter Server appliance uses an external Update Manager instance, you must run the
Migration Assistant on the computer running Update Manager.

System Requirements for the vCenter Server Installer

You can run the vCenter Server GUI or CLI installer from a network client machine that is running
on a Windows, Linux, or Mac operating system of a supported version.

To ensure optimal performance of the GUI and CLI installers, use a client machine that meets the
minimum hardware requirements.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-1. System Requirements for the GUI and CLI Installers

Operating System Supported Versions Minimum Hardware Configuration for Optimal Performance

Windows n Windows 10, 11 4 GB RAM, 2 CPU having 4 cores with 2.3 GHz, 32 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n Windows 2016 x64
bit
n Windows 2019 x64
bit
n Windows 2022 x64
bit

Linux n SUSE 15 4 GB RAM, 1 CPU having 2 cores with 2.3 GHz, 16 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n Ubuntu 18.04,
Note The CLI installer requires 64-bit OS.
20.04, 21.10

Mac n macOS 10.15, 11, 12 8 GB RAM, 1 CPU having 4 cores with 2.4 GHz, 150 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n macOS Catalina, Big
Sur, Monterey

Note For client machines that run on Mac 10.15 or later, concurrent GUI deployments of multiple
appliances are unsupported. You must deploy the appliances in a sequence.

Note Visual C++ redistributable libraries need to be installed to run the CLI installer on versions
of Windows older than Windows 10. The Microsoft installers for these libraries are located in the
vcsa-cli-installer/win32/vcredist directory.

Note Deploying the vCenter Server appliance with the GUI requires a minimum resolution of
1024x768 to properly display. Lower resolutions can truncate the UI elements.

Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer

The vCenter Server appliance ISO image contains GUI and CLI installers for the vCenter Server
appliance.

With the GUI and CLI executable files that are included in the vCenter Server installer, you can:

n Deploy the vCenter Server appliance.

n Upgrade the vCenter Server appliance.

n Converge older versions of vCenter Server with an external Platform Services Controller to
the current version of vCenter Server.

n Restore a vCenter Server appliance from a file-based backup.

Prerequisites

n Create an account at https://support.broadcom.com/web/ecx .

n Verify that your client machine meets the system requirements for the vCenter Server
installer. See System Requirements for the vCenter Server Installer.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Procedure

1 Log in to Broadcom Support Portal.

2 Download the vCenter Server appliance ISO image. See the Knowledge
Base article https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article/366685/vmware-vsphere-
downloads-vmware-converte.html .

3 Confirm that the md5sum is correct by using an MD5 checksum tool.

4 Mount the ISO image to the client machine from which you want to deploy, upgrade, migrate,
or restore the appliance.

Note ISO mounting software that does not allow more than eight directory levels, for
example, MagicISO Maker on Windows, is unsupported.

For Linux OS and Mac OS, Archive Manager is unsupported.

For Mac OS, you can use DiskImageMounter.

For Ubuntu 14.04, you can use Disk Image Mounter.
For SUSE 12 OS, you can use the terminal.

$ sudo mkdir mount_dir

$ sudo mount -o loop VMware-vCSA-all-version_number-build_number.iso mount_dir

Important Due to a security change in MacOS Catalina, you must modify the security
settings on your computer until the vCenter Server deployment completes. If you attempt to
run the installer under MacOS Catalina without modifying the security settings, the vCenter
Server installer reports the error:ovftool cannot be opened because the developer cannot
be verified. For more information, see KB 79416.

What to do next

Open the readme.txt file and review the information about the other files and directories in the
vCenter Server appliance ISO image.

Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network

Verify that all components on the vSphere network have their clocks synchronized. If the clocks
on the physical machines in your vSphere network are not synchronized, SSL certificates and
SAML tokens, which are time-sensitive, might not be recognized as valid in communications
between network machines.

Unsynchronized clocks can result in authentication problems, which can cause the installation to
fail or prevent the vCenter Server vmware-vpxd service from starting.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Time inconsistencies in vSphere can cause the first boot of a component in your environment to
fail at different services depending on where in the environment time is not accurate and when
the time is synchronized. Problems most commonly occur when the target ESXi host for the
destination vCenter Server is not synchronized with NTP or PTP. Similarly, issues can arise if the
destination vCenter Server migrates to an ESXi host set to a different time due to fully automated
DRS.

To avoid time synchronization issues, ensure that the following is correct before installing,
migrating, or upgrading a vCenter Server instance.

n The target ESXi host where the destination vCenter Server is to be deployed is synchronized
to NTP or PTP.

n The ESXi host running the source vCenter Server is synchronized to NTP or PTP.

n When upgrading or migrating from vSphere 6.7 to vSphere 8.0, if the vCenter Server
appliance is connected to an external Platform Services Controller, ensure the ESXi host
running the external Platform Services Controller is synchronized to NTP or PTP.

n If you are upgrading or migrating from vSphere 6.7 to vSphere 8.0, verify that the source
vCenter Server or vCenter Server appliance and external Platform Services Controller have
the correct time.

Verify that any Windows host machine on which vCenter Server runs is synchronized with
the Network Time Server (NTP) server. See the VMware knowledge base article at https://
kb.vmware.com/s/article/1318.

To synchronize ESXi clocks with an NTP or a PTP server, you can use the VMware Host Client.
For information about editing the time configuration of an ESXi host, see topic Edit the Time
Configuration of an ESXi Host in the VMware Host Client in the vSphere Single Host Management
- VMware Host Client documentation.
To learn how to change time synchronization settings for vCenter Server, see topic Configure
the System Time Zone and Time Synchronization Settings in the vCenter Server Configuration
documentation.

To learn how to edit the time configuration for a host by using the vSphere Client, see topic
Editing the Time Configuration Settings of a Host in the vCenter Server and Host Management
documentation.

Transferring Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance

Typically, data transfer happens as part of the upgrade downtime. However, in some scenarios
you can choose to transfer a part of the data after upgrade or migration to minimize the
downtime.

Transfer of data after upgrade or migration is supported in the following scenarios:

n Migrating vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance

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vCenter Server Upgrade

n Upgrading vCenter Server appliance with external database

Note You can only transfer data from external database to the embedded PostgreSQL
database in the background after upgrade or migration. Transferring data from an embedded
PostgreSQL database to another embedded PostgreSQL database after upgrade or
migration is not supported.

You can transfer the minimum amount of data necessary to be operational during the upgrade.
Later, you can transfer the remaining data from the external database to the embedded
PostgreSQL database in the background, preserving your deployment's historical event and
performance data.

You can transfer historical data after the upgrade or migration from the following vCenter Server
versions using external databases to the embedded PostgreSQL database within the vCenter
Server appliance.

Table 3-2. vCenter Server Database Support for Data Transfer After Upgrade or Migration
Support for Data Transfer After
vCenter Server Versions Databases Upgrade or Migration

vCenter Server appliance 6.7 Embedded PostgreSQL database Not Supported

External Oracle or MS SQL database Supported

vCenter Server for Windows 6.7
Embedded PostgreSQL database Not supported

vCenter Server appliance 7.0 Embedded PostgreSQL database Not supported

You can migrate the following types of data from an external database to the embedded
PostgreSQL database in use by version 8.0 of the vCenter Server appliance.

Configuration data

The minimum type of data you must transfer from your existing vCenter Server appliance
external database to upgrade or migrate to a functioning vCenter Server appliance. This data
can be transferred in a reasonably short amount of time, minimizing downtime during the
upgrade to vCenter Server 8.0.

Configuration and historical data

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vCenter Server Upgrade

In addition to the configuration data, you can choose to transfer historical data such as
usage statistics, events, and tasks. The vCenter Server installer gives you the option to copy
both the configuration and historical data at one time, or to copy only the configuration
data during the upgrade process. You can then choose to copy the historical data in the
background after you start your new vCenter Server.

Attention If you choose to copy all data at one time, you cannot start vCenter Server until all
the data has been transferred to the embedded PostgreSQL database within vCenter Server
8.0.

Configuration, historical, and performance metrics data

The largest amount of data you can choose to transfer to vCenter Server. You can copy
only the configuration data during the upgrade process, and then copy the historical and
performance data in the background after the upgrade or migration to vCenter Server 8.0
finishes.

Monitor and Manage Historical Data Migration

You can monitor and manage the background migration of historical data using the vCenter
Server Management Interface. You can perform the following data management tasks:

n Monitor the progress of the data migration.

n Pause the data import.

n Cancel the data import.

Important If you cancel the data import, the historical data is not imported to the embedded
PostgreSQL database. If you cancel the data import operation, you cannot recover the data.
If you do cancel the data import, and want to import the historical data later, you must restart
the upgrade or migration process from Stage 1 of the GUI installer.

See Monitor and Manage Historical Data Migration.

Prepare ESXi Hosts for vCenter Server Appliance Upgrade

Before upgrading to vCenter Server 8.0, you must prepare your ESXi hosts.

Prerequisites

To upgrade vCenter Server appliance, your ESXi hosts must meet the requirements for upgrade.

n ESXi hosts must be at version 6.7 or later. For information on ESXi compatibility, see the
VMware Compatibility Guide.

n Your source and target ESXi hosts must not be in lockdown or maintenance mode, and not
part of fully automated DRS clusters.

n Review your environment's Certificate Authority (CA) signed SSL certificates. To learn about
manually reviewing CA signed SSL certificates in a vSphere environment, see Knowledge
Base article KB 2111411.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Procedure

1 If you have Custom or Thumbprint certificates, see ESXi Host Upgrades and Certificates to
determine your preparatory steps.

2 If you have vSphere HA clusters, SSL certificate checking must be enabled.

If certificate checking is not enabled when you upgrade ESXi hosts, vSphere HA fails to
configure on the hosts.
a Select the vCenter Server appliance instance in the vSphere Client inventory tree.

b Select the Configure tab, and then under Settings select General.

c Click Edit.

d Select SSL settings.

Verify that vCenter Server requires verified host SSL certificates is selected.

Results

Your ESXi hosts are ready for the vCenter Server appliance upgrade.

ESXi Host Upgrades and Certificates

If you upgrade an ESXi host to ESXi 6.7 or later, the upgrade process replaces the self-signed
(thumbprint) certificates with VMCA-signed certificates. If the ESXi host uses custom certificates,
the upgrade process retains those certificates even if those certificates are expired or invalid.

The recommended upgrade workflow depends on the current certificates.

Host Provisioned with Thumbprint Certificates

If your host is currently using thumbprint certificates, it is automatically assigned VMCA
certificates as part of the upgrade process.

Note You cannot provision legacy hosts with VMCA certificates. You must upgrade those hosts
to ESXi 6.7 or later.

Host Provisioned with Custom Certificates

If your host is provisioned with custom certificates, usually third-party CA-signed certificates,
those certificates remain in place during upgrade. Change the certificate mode to Custom to
ensure that the certificates are not replaced accidentally during a certificate refresh later.

Note If your environment is in VMCA mode, and you refresh the certificates from the vSphere
Client, any existing certificates are replaced with certificates that are signed by VMCA.

Going forward, vCenter Server monitors the certificates and displays information, for example,
about certificate expiration, in the vSphere Client.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Hosts Provisioned with Auto Deploy

Hosts that are being provisioned by Auto Deploy are always assigned new certificates when they
are first booted with ESXi 6.7 or later software. When you upgrade a host that is provisioned by
Auto Deploy, the Auto Deploy server generates a certificate signing request (CSR) for the host
and submits it to VMCA. VMCA stores the signed certificate for the host. When the Auto Deploy
server provisions the host, it retrieves the certificate from VMCA and includes it as part of the
provisioning process.

You can use Auto Deploy with custom certificates.

Change the ESXi Certificate Mode

Use VMware Certificate Authority (VMCA) to provision the certificates of the ESXi hosts in
your environment unless your corporate policy requires that you use custom certificates. To
use custom certificates with a different root CA, edit the advanced vCenter Server setting,
vpxd.certmgmt.mode. After the change, the hosts are no longer automatically provisioned with
VMCA certificates when you refresh the certificates. You are responsible for the certificate
management in your environment.

You can use the advanced vCenter Server settings to change to thumbprint mode or to custom
CA mode. Use thumbprint mode only as a fallback option.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client, select the vCenter Server system that manages the hosts.

2 Click Configure, and under Settings, click Advanced Settings.

3 Click Edit Settings.

4 Click the Filter icon in the Name column, and in the Filter box, enter vpxd.certmgmt to
display only certificate management parameters.

Note The available options are vmca, custom, and thumbprint.

5 Change the value of vpxd.certmgmt.mode to custom if you intend to manage your own
certificates, and to thumbprint if you temporarily want to use thumbprint mode, and click
Save.

Determine the Oracle Database Size and the Storage Size for the
New Appliance
Before upgrading a vCenter Server appliance or migrating a vCenter Server on Windows that
uses an external Oracle database, you must determine the size of the existing database. Based
on the size of the existing database, you can calculate the minimum storage size for the new
vCenter Server appliance database using an embedded PostgreSQL database.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

You run scripts to determine the Oracle core table size, the events and tasks table size, and the
statistics table size. The Oracle core table corresponds to the database (/storage/db) partition
of the PostgreSQL database. The Oracle events and tasks and statistics tables correspond to the
statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/seat) partition of the PostgreSQL database.

During the upgrade of the appliance, you must select a storage size for the new appliance that is
at least twice the size of the Oracle tables size.

During the upgrade of the appliance, you can select the types of data to transfer to the new
appliance. To minimize upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, you can
choose to transfer only the configuration data.

Prerequisites

You must have the vCenter Server database login credentials.

Procedure

1 Log in to a SQL*Plus session with the vCenter Server database user.

2 Determine the core table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM
(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,
'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'
FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE (ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'CL_%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VDC_%')
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_VM%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_DATASTORE%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_PROPERTY_BULLETIN%');

The script returns the database storage size in MB.

3 Determine the events and tasks table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM

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vCenter Server Upgrade

(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,

'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'
FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE
ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%');

The script returns the events and tasks storage size in MB.

4 Determine the statistics table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM
(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,
'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'
FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE
ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%');

The script returns the statistics storage size in MB.

5 Calculate the minimum storage size for the new appliance that you are going to deploy
during the upgrade.

a The size of the database (/storage/db) partition of the embedded PostgreSQL database
must be at least twice the size of the Oracle core table returned in Step 2.

b The size of the statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/seat) partition of the
embedded PostgreSQL database must be at least twice the sum of the sizes of the Oracle
events and tasks and statistics tables returned in Step 3 and Step 4.
For example, if the Oracle core table is 100 MB, the events and tasks table is 1,000 MB, and
the statistics table is 2,000 MB, then the Postgres /storage/db partition must be at least
200 MB and the /storage/seat partition must be at least 6,000 MB.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source

Update Manager Machine
During the upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance that uses an external Update Manager, the
Migration Assistant must be running on the source Update Manager machine. This procedure
describes how to download and run the Migration Assistant manually before the upgrade.

The Migration Assistant facilitates the migration of the Update Manager server and database to
the new upgraded vCenter Server appliance. The Migration Assistant uses port 9123 by default.
If port 9123 is used by another service on your Update Manager machine, the Migration Assistant
automatically finds a different free port to use.

Alternatively, if you plan to upgrade the vCenter Server appliance by using the CLI installer, you
can add the source.vum section section and run.migration.assistant subsection to your
JSON template. For information about the CLI upgrade configuration parameters, see Upgrade
Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of vCenter Server Appliance .

Prerequisites

n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

n Log in to the source Update Manager machine as an administrator.

Procedure

1 From the vCenter Server appliance installer package, copy the migration-assistant
directory to the source Update Manager machine.

2 From the migration-assistant directory, double-click VMware-Migration-

Assistant.exe and the provide the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator password.

3 Leave the Migration Assistant window open until the upgrade of the vCenter Server appliance
finishes.

Results

When the pre-checks are finished and any errors are addressed, your source Update Manager
system is ready for the upgrade.

Caution Closing the Migration Assistant window causes the upgrade process to stop.

Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance

To ensure a successful upgrade of the vCenter Server appliance, you must perform the following
required tasks and pre-checks before beginning the upgrade process.

General Prerequisites
n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

n Verify that the clocks of all computers on the vSphere network are synchronized. See
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.

Target System Prerequisites

n Verify that your system meets the minimum software and hardware requirements. See
System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is
not in lockdown or maintenance mode.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host managed by vCenter Server,
review the Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) settings on the cluster. Ensure that the
DRS settings for the cluster on which the target ESXi host resides are not configured for Full
Automation. Set the Automation Level to Manual or Partially Automated. This Automation
Level ensures that the target ESXi host does not reboot during the upgrade process.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server
instance, verify that the cluster contains at least one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or
maintenance mode.

n If you plan to upgrade a vCenter Server instance in an environment that has vSphere with
Tanzu enabled, verify that you deploy the new appliance on a cluster where the Supervisor is
not running. Ensure that the DRS settings for the cluster on which the target ESXi host resides
are not configured for Full Automation.

Source System Prerequisites

n If the source appliance is on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server instance and
during upgrade:

n If you plan to use the ESXi host where the appliance resides, review the Distributed
Resource Scheduler (DRS) settings on the cluster. Ensure that the DRS settings of the
cluster is set to manual or partially automated so that the VMs of the source system do
not move during the upgrade.

n If you plan to use the vCenter Server instance where the appliance resides, you need not
modify the DRS settings of the cluster.

n Verify that port 22 is open on the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade. The
upgrade process establishes an inbound SSH connection to download the exported data
from the source vCenter Server appliance.

n If you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that is configured with an external Update
Manager, run the Migration Assistant on the source Update Manager computer.

For a GUI upgrade, you must run Migration Assistant manually. See Download and Run
VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

For a CLI upgrade, you can run Migration Assistant manually or automatically. To
run Migration Assistant automatically, add the source.vum section section and
run.migration.assistant subsection to your JSON template. See Upgrade Configuration
Parameters for CLI Upgrade of vCenter Server Appliance .

n Verify that port 443 is open on the source ESXi host on which the appliance that you want to
upgrade resides. The upgrade process establishes an HTTPS connection to the source ESXi
host to verify that the source appliance is ready for upgrade and to set up an SSH connection
between the new and the existing appliance.

Note When upgrading, the temporary vCenter Server instance requires the same access
rights as the permanent vCenter Server instance to port 443. Ensure that any firewalls in your
environment allow both the temporary and permanent vCenter Server instances to access
port 443.

n Verify that you have sufficient free disk space on the appliance that you want to upgrade so
that you can accommodate the data for the upgrade.

n Create an image-based backup (snapshot) of the vCenter Server appliance you are
upgrading as a precaution in case there is a failure during the upgrade process. If you are
upgrading a vCenter Server appliance with an external Platform Services Controller, you must
first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded Platform Services
Controller and then perform the upgrade. See Knowledge Base article KB 68137.

Important To take a pre-upgrade image-based backup in an Enhanced Linked Mode

environment, power off all the vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller nodes in your
environment, and back up each node. After you have taken backups of all the nodes, you can
restart them and proceed with the upgrade procedure.

If the upgrade fails, delete the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance, and restore the
vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller nodes from their respective backups. You
must restore all the nodes in the environment from their backups. Failing to do so will cause
the replication partners to be out of synchronization with the restored node.

To learn about image-based back, see "Image-Based Backup and Restore of a vCenter Server
Environment" in vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

n If you use an external database, determine the database size and the minimum storage size
for the new appliance. See Determine the Oracle Database Size and the Storage Size for the
New Appliance.

n If your deployment uses an external database, you must back up the external vCenter Server
appliance database.

n If you plan to upgrade a vCenter Server instance in an environment that has vSphere
with Tanzu enabled, ensure that the DRS settings of the cluster where the vCenter Server
appliance resides is set to manual or partially automated so that the VMs of the source
system do not move during the upgrade.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Network Prerequisites
n Verify that the new appliance can connect to the source ESXi host and vCenter Server
instance on which resides the appliance that you want to upgrade.

n If you plan to assign a static IP address and an FQDN as a system name in the temporary
network settings of the appliance, verify that you have configured the forward and reverse
DNS records for the IP address.

n If you plan to assign a DHCP IP address in the temporary network settings of the new vCenter
Server appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new appliance is
in the same subnet as the ESXi host on which the existing vCenter Server appliance runs.

n If you plan to assign a DHCP IPv4 address in the temporary network settings of the new
vCenter Server appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new
appliance is connected to at least one network that is associated with a port group which
accepts MAC address changes. Consider the default security policy of a distributed virtual
switch, which is to reject MAC address changes. For information about how to configure the
security policy for a switch or port group, see vSphere Networking.

GUI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance

You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance.

To perform the GUI upgrade, download the vCenter Server appliance installer on a network
client machine, run the Upgrade Wizard from the client machine, and provide the inputs for the
deployment and setup of the new upgraded appliance.

Note When you upgrade vCenter Server 6.7 or 7.0 with an external Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server 8.0, the upgrade process converges the external Platform Services
Controller into the new vCenter Server appliance. The new vCenter Server contains all Platform
Services Controller services, preserving the functionality and workflows, including authentication,
certificate management, and licensing. It is no longer necessary nor possible to upgrade and use
an external Platform Services Controller.

After successfully upgrading your environment to vCenter Server 8.0, the pre-existing Platform
Services Controller will be powered off, and you can remove it from your vSphere inventory. See
Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

The GUI upgrade process includes a series of two stages.

Figure 3-1. Stage 1 - OVA Deployment

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vCenter Server Upgrade

The first stage walks you through the deployment wizard to get the deployment type of the
source appliance that you want to upgrade and configure the new appliance settings. During this
stage, you deploy the new appliance with temporary network settings. This stage finishes the
deployment of the OVA file on the target server with the same deployment type as the source
appliance and the appliance settings that you provide.

As an alternative to performing the first stage of the upgrade with the GUI installer, you can
deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server appliance using the vSphere Client or VMware
Host Client. To deploy the OVA file on an ESXi host or vCenter Server instance 6.7 or later, you
can also use the vSphere Client. After the OVA deployment, you must log in to the appliance
management interface of the newly deployed appliance to proceed with the second stage of the
upgrade process.

Figure 3-2. Stage 2 - Appliance Setup

The second stage walks you through the setup wizard to select the data types to transfer from
the old to the new appliance. The new appliance uses the temporary network settings until the
data transfer finishes. After the data transfer finishes, the new appliance assumes the network
settings of the old appliance. This stage finishes the data transfer, starts the services of the new
upgraded appliance, and powers off the old appliance.

As an alternative to performing the second stage of the upgrade with the GUI installer, you
can log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface of the newly deployed appliance, https://
FQDN_or_IP_address:5480.

Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7

or 7.0
The GUI upgrade wizard prompts you for information about the vCenter Server appliance that
you want to upgrade, deployment information for the new vCenter Server appliance 8.0. It is a
best practice to keep a record of the values that you enter.

You can use this worksheet to record the information that you need for upgrading a vCenter
Server appliance with an embedded Platform Services Controller or a vCenter Server appliance
with an external Platform Services Controller.

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

All deployment types FQDN or IP address of the source appliance -

that you want to upgrade.

HTTPS port of the source appliance. 443

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user administrator@vsp

name of the source appliance. here.local

Important The user must be

administrator@your_domain_name.

Password of the vCenter Single Sign-On -

administrator user.

Password of the root user of the source -

appliance

All deployment types FQDN or IP address of the source server on -

which resides that appliance that you want to
upgrade.
The source server can be either an ESXi host
or a vCenter Server instance.

Note The source server cannot be the

vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade. In such cases, use the source ESXi
host.

HTTPS port of the source server. 443

User name with administrative privileges on -

the source server.
n If your source server is an ESXi host, use
root.
n If your source server is a
vCenter Server instance, use
user_name@your_domain_name, for
example, administrator@vsphere.local.

Password of the user with administrative -

privileges on the source server.

All deployment types FQDN or IP address of the target server on -

which you want to deploy the new appliance.
The target server can be either an ESXi host or
a vCenter Server instance.

Note The target server cannot be the

vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade. In such cases, use an ESXi host as
a target server.

HTTPS port of the target server. 443

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

User name with administrative privileges on -

the target server
n If your target server is an ESXi host, use
root.
n If your target server is a
vCenter Server instance, use
user_name@your_domain_name, for
example, administrator@vsphere.local.

Password of the user with administrative -

privileges on the target server.

All deployment types Data center from the vCenter Server inventory -
Only if your target server on which you want to deploy the new
is a vCenter Server appliance.
instance. Optionally you can provide a data center
folder.

ESXi host or DRS cluster from the data center -

inventory on which you want to deploy the
new appliance .

All deployment types The virtual machine name for the new VMware vCenter
appliance. Server Appliance
n Must not contain a percent sign (%),
backslash (\), or forward slash (/).
n Must be no more than 80 characters in
length.

All deployment types Password for the root user of the appliance -
operating system.
n Must contain only the lower ASCII
character set without spaces.
n Must be at least 8 characters, but no more
than 20 characters in length.
n Must contain at least one uppercase letter.
n Must contain at least one lowercase letter.
n Must contain at least one number.
n Must contain at least one special character,
for example, a dollar sign ($), hash key (#),
at sign (@), period (.), or exclamation mark
(!).

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

n vCenter Server Deployment size of the new vCenter Server The size of the
appliance 6.7 with appliance for your vSphere environment. source vCenter
an external Platform n Tiny Server appliance
Services Controller and Platform
Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs and 12
n vCenter Server Services Controller
GB of memory.
appliance 6.7 with an determines
embedded Platform Suitable for environments with up to 10 the default
Services Controller hosts or 100 virtual machines. deployment size.
Using this
n vCenter Server n Small
information, the
appliance 7.0
Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs and 19 upgrade installer
GB of memory. calculates the best
size to use for
Suitable for environments with up to 100
your environment,
hosts or 1,000 virtual machines.
which might be
n Medium
the same as
Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs and 28 your existing
GB of memory. deployment, or
calculated to the
Suitable for environments with up to 400
next largest size.
hosts or 4,000 virtual machines.
n Large

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs and 37

GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000

hosts or 10,000 virtual machines.
n X-Large

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs and 56

GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,000

hosts or 35,000 virtual machines.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

n vCenter Server Storage size of the new vCenter Server Default

appliance 6.7 with appliance for your vSphere environment.
Note The sizing
an external Platform Increase the default storage size if you want
algorithm in use
Services Controller larger volume for SEAT data (stats, events,
by the upgrade
alarms, and tasks).
installer might
Note Consider the database size of the select a larger
appliance that you want to upgrade and the storage size for
types of the data that you want transfer to the your environment.
new appliance. For an external database, see Items that
Determine the Oracle Database Size and the might affect the
Storage Size for the New Appliance. storage size
selected by the
n Default installer include
For tiny deployment size, deploys the modifications to
appliance with 415 GB of storage. the vCenter
Server appliance
For small deployment size, deploys the disks (for example,
appliance with 480 GB of storage. changing the size
For medium deployment size, deploys the of the logging
appliance with 700 GB of storage. partition), or
databases having
For large deployment size, deploys the a database table
appliance with 1065 GB of storage. that the installer
For x-large deployment size, deploys the determines to
appliance with 1805 GB of storage. be exceptionally
large and
n Large
requiring
For tiny deployment size, deploys the additional hard
appliance with 1490 GB of storage. disk space.

For small deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 1535 GB of storage.

For medium deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 1700 GB of storage.

For large deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 1765 GB of storage.

For x-large deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 1905 GB of storage.
n X-Large

For tiny deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 3245 GB of storage.

For small deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 3295 GB of storage.

For medium deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 3460 GB of storage.

For large deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 3525 GB of storage.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

For x-large deployment size, deploys the

appliance with 3665 GB of storage.

All deployment types Name of the datastore on which you want to -

store the configuration files and virtual disks of
the new appliance.

Note The installer displays a list of datastores

that are accessible from your target server.

Enable or deactivate Thin Disk Mode. Disabled

All deployment types Name of the network to which to connect the -

new appliance.

Note The installer displays a drop-down

menu with networks that depend on the
network settings of your target server. If you
are deploying the appliance directly on an
ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are not supported and are not
displayed in the drop-down menu.

The network must be accessible from the

source server on which resides that appliance
that you want to upgrade.
The network must be accessible from the
physical client machine from which you
perform the deployment.

IP version for the appliance temporary address IPv4

Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

IP assignment for the appliance temporary static

address
Can be either static or DHCP.

All deployment types Temporary system name (FQDN or IP -

Only if you use a address)
static assignment for the The system name is used for managing the
temporary IP address. local system. The system name must be
FQDN. If a DNS server is not available, provide
a static IP address.

Temporary IP address -

For IPv4 version, a subnet mask as a dot -

decimal notation or a network prefix as an
integer between 0 and 32.
For IPv6 version, a network prefix as an
integer between 0 and 128.

Default gateway. -

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Table 3-3. Required Information During Stage 1 of the Upgrade (continued)

Required for Upgrade of Required Information Default Your Entry

DNS servers separated by commas. -

All deployment types Temporary system name (FQDN). -

Only if you use a DHCP
assignment with IPv4
version for the temporary
IP address and a DDNS
server is available in your
environment.

Table 3-4. Required Information During Stage 2 of the Upgrade

Required for Required Information Default Your Entry

n vCenter Server appliance 7.0 Data types to transfer from the old -
n vCenter Server appliance appliance to the new appliance.
6.7 with an embedded or In addition to the configuration data,
external Platform Services you can transfer the events, tasks, and,
Controller performance metrics.

Note For minimum upgrade time

and storage requirement for the new
appliance, select to transfer only the
configuration data.

n vCenter Server appliance 7.0 Join or do not participate in Join the CEIP.
n vCenter Server appliance 6.7 the VMware Customer Experience
with an embedded Platform Improvement Program (CEIP).
Services Controller For information about the CEIP, see
the Configuring Customer Experience
Improvement Program section in
vCenter Server and Host Management.

Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 with an Embedded Platform

Services Controller or 7.0 by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance
6.7 that uses an embedded Platform Services Controller or 7.0 to vCenter Server appliance 8.0.
You must run the GUI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or Mac OS X machine that is in the same
network as the appliance that you want to upgrade.

Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

n See Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0.

Procedure

1 Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file, which is included in the
vCenter Server appliance installer, for the new vCenter Server appliance.

2 Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server Appliance With
an Embedded Platform Services Controller
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process
to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed
vCenter Server appliance 8.0.

Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file, which is included in the vCenter
Server appliance installer, for the new vCenter Server appliance.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Upgrade.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the upgrade process and click Next.

4 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

5 Connect to the source appliance that you want to upgrade.

a Enter the information about the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade, and click Connect to Source.

Option Action

Appliance FQDN or IP address Enter the IP address or FQDN of the vCenter Server appliance that you
want to upgrade.

Appliance HTTPS port If the source appliance uses a custom HTTPS port, change the default
value to that of the custom port. The default port value is 443.
Custom port values are supported beginning with vCenter Server
appliance version 6.5 Update 2. If you are upgrading from earlier
versions, you cannot specify a custom port.

b Enter the information about the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator and root user.

Option Action

SSO user name Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

SSO password Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.

Appliance (OS) root password Enter the password of the root user.

c Enter the information about the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance on which
resides the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade and click Next.

Option Description

Source server or host name IP address or FQDN of the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance
on which the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade resides.

Note The source vCenter Server instance cannot be the vCenter Server
appliance that you want to upgrade. In such cases, use the source ESXi
host.

HTTPS port If the ESXi host or vCenter Server instance uses a custom HTTPS port,
change the default value.
The default value is 443.

User name User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

Password Password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

6 Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprints of the SSL certificates that
are installed on the source appliance and its source server, and click Yes to accept the
certificate thumbprints.

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7 Connect to the target server on which you want to deploy the new vCenter Server appliance.

Option Steps

You can connect to an ESXi 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
host on which to deploy the 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
new appliance. 3 Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on
the ESXi host, for example, the root user.
4 Click Next.
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.

You can connect to a vCenter 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
Server instance and browse 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
the inventory to select an 3 Enter the user name and password of a vCenter Single Sign-On user with
ESXi host or DRS cluster on administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the
which to deploy the new administrator@your_domain_name user.
appliance.
4 Click Next.
Note The target server 5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.
cannot be the vCenter Server 6 Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS
appliance that you want to cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance, and click Next
upgrade. In such cases, use
an ESXi host as a target Note You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least
server. one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
7 Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the new
appliance, and click Next.

8 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the new vCenter Server appliance,
set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The appliance name must not contain a percent sign (%), backslash (\), or forward slash (/)
and must be no more than 80 characters in length.

The password must contain only lower ASCII characters without spaces, at least eight
characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase letters, and a special character, for example,
an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sign (@), or brackets (()).

Note The root password of the old appliance is not transferred to the new upgraded
appliance.

9 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Deployment Size Option Description

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

10 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance and click Next.

Important You must consider the storage size of the appliance that you are upgrading and
the database size if external.

Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

11 From the list of available datastores, select the location where all the virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks will be stored and, optionally, enable thin provisioning
by selecting Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

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12 Configure the temporary network for communication between the vCenter Server appliance
that you want to upgrade and the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
type n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address, subnet mask or prefix length, default
gateway, and DNS servers.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment. Optionally, you can provide a temporary system name
(FQDN) if a DDNS server is available in your environment.

13 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the new vCenter
Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

14 Wait for the OVA deployment process to finish and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of
the upgrade process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the
new appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface of the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance to transfer the data
from the old appliance and set up the services.

Results

The newly deployed vCenter Server appliance 8.0 is running on the target server but is not
configured.

Important The data from the old appliance is not transferred and the services of the new
appliance are not started.

Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server
Appliance With an Embedded Platform Services Controller
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process to
transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter
Server appliance 8.0.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Prerequisites

Understand the data migration options available to you when upgrading or migrating to a
vCenter Server appliance with an embedded PostgreSQL database. See Transferring Data from
an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the upgrade process and click Next.

2 Wait for the pre-upgrade check to finish and read the pre-upgrade check result if any.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains error messages, read the messages and click
Logs to export and download a support bundle for troubleshooting.

You cannot proceed with the upgrade until you have corrected the errors.

Important If you have provided incorrect vCenter Single Sign-On user name and
password of the source appliance during stage 1, the pre-upgrade check fails with an
authentication error.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains warning messages, read the messages and click
Close.

After you have verified that your system meets the requirements from the warning
message, you can proceed with the upgrade.

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3 Connect to the source appliance that you want to upgrade.

a Enter the information about the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade, and click Connect to Source.

Option Action

Appliance FQDN or IP address Enter the IP address or FQDN of the vCenter Server appliance that you
want to upgrade.

Appliance HTTPS port If the source appliance uses a custom HTTPS port, change the default
value to that of the custom port. The default port value is 443.
Custom port values are supported beginning with vCenter Server
appliance version 6.5 Update 2. If you are upgrading from earlier
versions, you cannot specify a custom port.

b Enter the information about the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator and root user.

Option Action

SSO user name Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

SSO password Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.

Appliance (OS) root password Enter the password of the root user.

c Enter the information about the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance on which
resides the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade and click Next.

Option Description

Source server or host name IP address or FQDN of the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance
on which the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade resides.

Note The source vCenter Server instance cannot be the vCenter Server
appliance that you want to upgrade. In such cases, use the source ESXi
host.

HTTPS port If the ESXi host or vCenter Server instance uses a custom HTTPS port,
change the default value.
The default value is 443.

User name User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

Password Password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

4 On the Select migration data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from
the old appliance to the new, upgraded appliance.

A large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance. For the
minimum upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, select to transfer
only the configuration data. If you are using an external Oracle database, you can also
choose to migrate historical and performance metrics data in the background after you
deploy and start the new vCenter Server appliance.

5 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose if
you want to join the program.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

6 On the Ready to complete page, review the upgrade settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

7 Read the shutdown warning message and click OK.

8 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish and click OK to go to the vCenter
Server Getting Started page.

Results

The vCenter Server appliance is upgraded. The old vCenter Server appliance is powered off and
the new appliance starts.

What to do next

n Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.

n If the old vCenter Server appliance uses a non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group,
to preserve the port group setting, you can manually connect the new appliance to the
original non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group. For information about configuring
virtual machine networking on a vSphere distributed switch, see vSphere Networking.

n You can configure high availability for the vCenter Server appliance. For information about
providing vCenter Server appliance high availability, see vSphere Availability.

Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0 with an External

Platform Services Controller Instance by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance
6.7 or 7.0 that uses an external Platform Services Controller instance to vCenter Server appliance
8.0. You must run the GUI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or Mac OS X computer that is in the
same network as the appliance that you want to upgrade.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Prerequisites

n The new vCenter Server appliance contains all Platform Services Controller services. It is no
longer necessary nor possible to deploy and use an external Platform Services Controller, as
all Platform Services Controller services are consolidated into vCenter Server. To learn more
about this change to vCenter Server, see Removal of Platform Services Controller.

n See Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance.

n See Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0.

Procedure

1 Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance 8.0
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server
appliance 8.0.

2 Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server Appliance
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process
to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed
vCenter Server appliance 8.0.

Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter Server Appliance 8.0
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server
appliance 8.0.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Upgrade.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the upgrade process and click Next.

4 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

5 Connect to the source appliance that you want to upgrade.

a Enter the information about the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade, and click Connect to Source.

Option Action

Appliance FQDN or IP address Enter the IP address or FQDN of the vCenter Server appliance that you
want to upgrade.

Appliance HTTPS port If the source appliance uses a custom HTTPS port, change the default
value to that of the custom port. The default port value is 443.
Custom port values are supported beginning with vCenter Server
appliance version 6.5 Update 2. If you are upgrading from earlier
versions, you cannot specify a custom port.

b Enter the information about the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator and root user.

Option Action

SSO user name Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

SSO password Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.

Appliance (OS) root password Enter the password of the root user.

c Enter the information about the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance on which
resides the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade and click Next.

Option Description

Source server or host name IP address or FQDN of the source ESXi host or vCenter Server instance
on which the vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade resides.

Note The source vCenter Server instance cannot be the vCenter Server
appliance that you want to upgrade. In such cases, use the source ESXi
host.

HTTPS port If the ESXi host or vCenter Server instance uses a custom HTTPS port,
change the default value.
The default value is 443.

User name User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

Password Password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

6 Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprints of the SSL certificates that
are installed on the source appliance and its source server, and click Yes to accept the
certificate thumbprints.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

7 Confirm that the vCenter Server appliance using an external Platform Services Controller will
be converged to a vCenter Server appliance with the Platform Services Controller services
consolidated within vCenter Server, and click Yes to accept and continue with the upgrade.

8 Connect to the target server on which you want to deploy the new vCenter Server appliance.

Option Steps

You can connect to an ESXi 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
host on which to deploy the 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
new appliance. 3 Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on
the ESXi host, for example, the root user.
4 Click Next.
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.

You can connect to a vCenter 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
Server instance and browse 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
the inventory to select an 3 Enter the user name and password of a vCenter Single Sign-On user with
ESXi host or DRS cluster on administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the
which to deploy the new administrator@your_domain_name user.
appliance.
4 Click Next.
Note The target server 5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.
cannot be the vCenter Server 6 Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS
appliance that you want to cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance, and click Next
upgrade. In such cases, use
an ESXi host as a target Note You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least
server. one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
7 Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the new
appliance, and click Next.

9 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the new vCenter Server appliance,
set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The appliance name must not contain a percent sign (%), backslash (\), or forward slash (/)
and must be no more than 80 characters in length.

The password must contain only lower ASCII characters without spaces, at least eight
characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase letters, and a special character, for example,
an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sign (@), or brackets (()).

Note The root password of the old appliance is not transferred to the new upgraded
appliance.

10 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Deployment Size Option Description

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

11 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance and click Next.

Important You must consider the storage size of the appliance that you are upgrading and
the database size if external.

Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

12 From the list of available datastores, select the location where all the virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks will be stored and, optionally, enable thin provisioning
by selecting Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

13 Configure the temporary network for communication between the vCenter Server appliance
that you want to upgrade and the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
type n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address, subnet mask or prefix length, default
gateway, and DNS servers.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment. Optionally, you can provide a temporary system name
(FQDN) if a DDNS server is available in your environment.

14 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the new vCenter
Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

15 Wait for the OVA deployment process to finish and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of
the upgrade process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the
new appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface of the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance to transfer the data
from the old appliance and set up the services.

Results

The newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance 8.0 is running on the target server but is
not configured.

What to do next

Proceed to stage 2 of the upgrade process to transfer the data from the source vCenter Server
appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance. See Stage 2 -
Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server Appliance.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Stage 2 - Transfer the Data and Set up the Newly Deployed vCenter Server
Appliance
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process to
transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter
Server appliance 8.0.

Prerequisites

Understand the data migration options available to you when upgrading or migrating to a
vCenter Server appliance with an embedded PostgreSQL database. See Transferring Data from
an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the upgrade process and click Next.

2 Wait for the pre-upgrade check to finish and read the pre-upgrade check result if any.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains error messages, read the messages and click
Logs to export and download a support bundle for troubleshooting.

You cannot proceed with the upgrade until you have corrected the errors.

Important If you have provided incorrect vCenter Single Sign-On user name and
password of the source appliance during stage 1, the pre-upgrade check fails with an
authentication error.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains warning messages, read the messages and click
Close.

After you have verified that your system meets the requirements from the warning
message, you can proceed with the upgrade.

3 Specify the replication topology for the vCenter Server. When converging vCenter Server
instance with an external Platform Services Controller you must specify the replication
topology.

Convergence is the process of converting a vCenter Server instance with an external Platform
Services Controller to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the
appliance.
n This is the first vCenter Server in the topology that I want to converge.

n This is a subsequent vCenter Server.

If this is a subsequent vCenter Server, provide the IP address of its partner vCenter Server
and its HTTPS port.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

4 On the Select upgrade data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from
the old vCenter Server appliance to the new, upgraded vCenter Server appliance.

A large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance. For the
minimum upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, select to transfer
only the configuration data.

Note If you are using an external Oracle database, you can also choose to migrate historical
and performance metrics data in the background after you deploy and start the new vCenter
Server appliance.

5 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose if
you want to join the program.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

6 On the Ready to complete page, review the upgrade settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

7 Read the shutdown warning message and click OK.

8 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish and click OK to go to the vCenter
Server Getting Started page.

Results

The vCenter Server appliance is upgraded. The old vCenter Server appliance is powered off and
the new appliance starts.

What to do next

n Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.

n If the old vCenter Server appliance uses a non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group,
to preserve the port group setting, you can manually connect the new appliance to the
original non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group. For information about configuring
virtual machine networking on a vSphere distributed switch, see vSphere Networking.

n Upgrade all vCenter Server instances in the vCenter Single Sign-On domain.

n After converging a vCenter Server with external Platform Services Controller to a vCenter
Server appliance, you must decommission the original external Platform Services Controller.
Decommissioning a Platform Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single
sign-on domain. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

n You can configure high availability for the vCenter Server appliance. For information about
providing vCenter Server appliance high availability, see vSphere Availability.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Upgrading vCenter Server in High Availability Environments

You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance in a
high availability (HA) environment.

n Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments

To ensure a successful upgrade of vCenter Server in a high availability (HA) environment,
your environment must meet certain prerequisites before running the upgrade.

n Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 7.0 or 6.7 HA Cluster with an Embedded Platform
Services Controller by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 6.7 or 7.0 in a High Availability (HA) cluster that uses an embedded vCenter Single
Sign-On or Platform Services Controller to vCenter Server appliance 8.0. You must run the
GUI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or Macintosh computer that is in the same network as
the appliance that you want to upgrade.

n Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 HA Cluster with an External Platform Services
Controller by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter HA cluster 6.7
that uses an external Platform Services Controller instance to vCenter Server appliance 8.0.
You must run the GUI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or Macintosh computer that is in the
same network as the appliance that you want to upgrade.

Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability

Environments
To ensure a successful upgrade of vCenter Server in a high availability (HA) environment, your
environment must meet certain prerequisites before running the upgrade.

General Prerequisites
Ensure that your environment meets the prerequisites for upgrading vCenter Server appliance.
See Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance.

High Availability Prerequisites

In addition to the prerequisites for upgrading a standard vCenter Server appliance, the vCenter
High Availability (vCenter HA) upgrade has the following prerequisites.

n A vCenter HA cluster consists of three vCenter Server appliances that act as Active, Passive,
and Witness nodes. The Active node must be configured as the vCenter HA node.

n The Active node is part of the vCenter HA cluster.

n All nodes must be present in the cluster.

n The vCenter HA cluster must be in a healthy state.

n The vCenter HA cluster must be in enabled mode.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

n The host that has the vCenter Server virtual machine (VM) must be managed by a container
vCenter Server. It must not be standalone.

n The target vCenter Server must have the same placement as the source vCenter Server.

n vCenter HA cannot be set up on a vCenter Server that has disks on more than one datastore.

To learn more about vCenter HA configuration, see vSphere Availability.

Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 7.0 or 6.7 HA Cluster with an

Embedded Platform Services Controller by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance
6.7 or 7.0 in a High Availability (HA) cluster that uses an embedded vCenter Single Sign-On or
Platform Services Controller to vCenter Server appliance 8.0. You must run the GUI upgrade from
a Windows, Linux, or Macintosh computer that is in the same network as the appliance that you
want to upgrade.

You can deploy version 8.0 of the vCenter Server appliance on hosts that are running ESXi 6.7 or
later and on vCenter Server instances 6.7 or later.

A vCenter HA cluster consists of three vCenter Server appliances that act as Active, Passive, and
Witness nodes. The Active vCenter HA node is upgraded using a migration-based upgrade while
preserving the existing configuration.

Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments.

n See Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0.

Procedure

1 Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster
In stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file for the new vCenter Server
appliance.

2 Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High Availability Cluster
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade
process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly
deployed vCenter Server appliance. When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high
availability protection.

Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster
In stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file for the new vCenter Server appliance.

Prerequisites

Ensure that your environment meets the prerequisites for upgrading a vCenter HA cluster. See
Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments.

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Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Upgrade.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the upgrade process and click Next.

4 Connect to the source appliance that you want to upgrade. This appliance is the Active
vCenter HA node.

a Enter the information about the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade, and click Connect to Source.

Option Action

Appliance FQDN or IP address Enter the IP address or FQDN of the Active vCenter HA node that you
want to upgrade.

Appliance HTTPS port The default value (443) is displayed and cannot be edited.

b Enter the information about the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator and root user.

Option Action

SSO user name Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

SSO password Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.

Appliance (OS) root password Enter the password of the root user.

c Enter the information about the source vCenter Server instance on which resides the
vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade and click Next.

Option Description

Source server or host name IP address or FQDN of the Active node. The Active node must be
configured as the vCenter HA node.

HTTPS port If the vCenter Server instance uses a custom HTTPS port, change the
default value.
The default value is 443.

User name User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

Password Password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

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5 Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprints of the SSL certificates that
are installed on the source appliance and its source server, and click Yes to accept the
certificate thumbprints.

6 If vCenter HA is successfully detected, the target appliance is set to the manager of the
source appliance. Click OK.

The appliance deployment target information is populated.

7 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the target vCenter Server
appliance, set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The password must contain at least eight characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase
letters, and a special character, for example, an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sign
(@), or brackets (()).

Note The root password of the source is not transferred to the target appliance.

8 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

9 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance and click Next.

Important You must consider the storage size of the appliance that you are upgrading and
the database size if external.

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Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

10 From the list of available datastores, select the location to store the virtual machine (VM)
configuration files and virtual disks, and, optionally, enable thin provisioning by selecting
Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

Note vCenter HA cannot be set up on a vCenter Server that has disks on more than one
datastore.

11 Configure the temporary network for communication between the vCenter Server appliance
that you want to upgrade and the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
type n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address, subnet mask or prefix length, default
gateway, and DNS servers.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment. Optionally, you can provide a temporary system name
(FQDN) if a DDNS server is available in your environment.

12 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the new vCenter
Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

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13 Wait for the OVA deployment process to finish and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of
the upgrade process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the
new appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface of the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance to transfer the data
from the old appliance and set up the services.

Results

The newly deployed vCenter Server appliance 8.0 is running on the target server but is not
configured.

Important The data from the old appliance is not transferred and the services of the new
appliance are not started.

Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High
Availability Cluster
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process to
transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter
Server appliance. When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high availability protection.

Prerequisites

Understand the data migration options available to you when upgrading or migrating to a
vCenter Server appliance with an embedded PostgreSQL database. You can select to migrate
historical and other types of data in the background after deploying and starting vCenter Server.
See Transferring Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the deployment process and click Next.

2 Wait for the pre-upgrade check to finish and read the pre-upgrade check result if any.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains error messages, read the messages and click
Logs to export and download a support bundle for troubleshooting.

You cannot proceed with the upgrade until you have corrected the errors.

Important If you have provided incorrect vCenter Single Sign-On user name and
password of the source appliance during stage 1, the pre-upgrade check fails with an
authentication error.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains warning messages, read the messages and click
Close.

After you have verified that your system meets the requirements from the warning
message, you can proceed with the upgrade.

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3 On the Select migration data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from
the old appliance to the new, upgraded appliance.

A large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance. For the
minimum upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, select to transfer
only the configuration data. If you are using an external Oracle database, you can also
choose to migrate historical and performance metrics data in the background after you
deploy and start the new vCenter Server appliance.

4 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose if
you want to join the program.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

5 On the Ready to complete page, review the upgrade settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

6 Read the shutdown warning message and click OK.

7 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish and click OK to go to the vCenter
Server Getting Started page.

Results

The vCenter Server appliance is upgraded. The old vCenter Server appliance is powered off and
the new appliance starts.

After the Active node is upgraded, Auto Deployment automatically creates new Passive and
Witness nodes using a clone operation. For Manual Deployment, nodes are not created
automatically. You must clone the Passive and Witness virtual machines, and set the cluster
mode to Enabled.

When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high availability protection. You can click Edit
to enter Maintenance Mode, Deactivate, or Remove vCenter HA. You can also Initiate vCenter HA
failover.

What to do next

For information about configuring and managing vCenter HA, see vSphere Availability.

Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 HA Cluster with an External

Platform Services Controller by Using the GUI
You can use the GUI installer to perform an interactive upgrade of a vCenter HA cluster 6.7 that
uses an external Platform Services Controller instance to vCenter Server appliance 8.0. You must
run the GUI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or Macintosh computer that is in the same network
as the appliance that you want to upgrade.

A vCenter HA cluster consists of three vCenter Server appliances that act as Active, Passive, and
Witness nodes. The Active vCenter HA node is upgraded using a migration-based upgrade while
preserving the existing configuration.

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Prerequisites

n The new vCenter Server appliance contains all Platform Services Controller services. It is no
longer necessary nor possible to deploy and use an external Platform Services Controller, as
all Platform Services Controller services are consolidated into vCenter Server. To learn more
about this change to vCenter Server, see Removal of Platform Services Controller.

n Ensure that your environment meets the prerequisites for upgrading a vCenter HA cluster.
See Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments.

n See Required Information for Upgrading a vCenter Server Appliance 6.7 or 7.0.

Procedure

1 Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server
appliance 8.0.

2 Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High Availability Cluster
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade
process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly
deployed vCenter Server appliance. When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high
availability protection.

Stage 1 - Deploy the OVA File of the New vCenter High Availability Cluster
With stage 1 of the upgrade process, you deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server
appliance 8.0.

Prerequisites

Ensure that your environment meets the prerequisites for upgrading a vCenter HA cluster. See
Prerequisites for Upgrading vCenter Server High Availability Environments.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Upgrade.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the upgrade process and click Next.

4 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

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5 Connect to the source appliance that you want to upgrade. This appliance is the Active
vCenter HA node.

a Enter the information about the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
upgrade, and click Connect to Source.

Option Action

Appliance FQDN or IP address Enter the IP address or FQDN of the Active vCenter HA node that you
want to upgrade.

Appliance HTTPS port The default value (443) is displayed and cannot be edited.

b Enter the information about the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator and root user.

Option Action

SSO user name Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

SSO password Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.

Appliance (OS) root password Enter the password of the root user.

c Enter the information about the source vCenter Server instance on which resides the
vCenter Server appliance that you want to upgrade and click Next.

Option Description

Source server or host name IP address or FQDN of the Active node. The Active node must be
configured as the vCenter HA node.

HTTPS port If the vCenter Server instance uses a custom HTTPS port, change the
default value.
The default value is 443.

User name User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

Password Password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host or
vCenter Server instance.

6 Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprints of the SSL certificates that
are installed on the source appliance and its source server, and click Yes to accept the
certificate thumbprints.

7 Confirm that the vCenter Server appliance using an external Platform Services Controller will
be converged to a vCenter Server appliance with the Platform Services Controller services
consolidated within vCenter Server, and click Yes to accept and continue with the upgrade.

8 If vCenter Server HA is successfully detected, the target appliance is set to the manager of
the source appliance. Click OK.

The appliance deployment target information is populated.

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9 Connect to the target server on which you want to deploy the new vCenter Server appliance.

Option Steps

You can connect to an ESXi 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
host on which to deploy the 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
new appliance. 3 Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on
the ESXi host, for example, the root user.
4 Click Next.
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.

You can connect to a vCenter 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
Server instance and browse 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
the inventory to select an 3 Enter the user name and password of a vCenter Single Sign-On user with
ESXi host or DRS cluster on administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the
which to deploy the new administrator@your_domain_name user.
appliance.
4 Click Next.
Note The target server 5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.
cannot be the vCenter Server 6 Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS
appliance that you want to cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance, and click Next
upgrade. In such cases, use
an ESXi host as a target Note You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least
server. one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
7 Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the new
appliance, and click Next.

10 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the new vCenter Server appliance,
set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The appliance name must not contain a percent sign (%), backslash (\), or forward slash (/)
and must be no more than 80 characters in length.

The password must contain only lower ASCII characters without spaces, at least eight
characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase letters, and a special character, for example,
an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sign (@), or brackets (()).

Note The root password of the old appliance is not transferred to the new upgraded
appliance.

11 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Deployment Size Option Description

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

12 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Important You must consider the storage size of the appliance that you are upgrading and
the database size if external.

Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

13 From the list of available datastores, select the location to store the virtual machine (VM)
configuration files and virtual disks, and, optionally, enable thin provisioning by selecting
Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

Note vCenter HA cannot be set up on a vCenter Server that has disks on more than one
datastore.

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14 Configure the temporary network for communication between the vCenter Server appliance
that you want to upgrade and the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed virtual
port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
type n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address, subnet mask or prefix length, default
gateway, and DNS servers.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment. Optionally, you can provide a temporary system name
(FQDN) if a DDNS server is available in your environment.

15 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the new vCenter
Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

16 Wait for the OVA deployment process to finish and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of
the upgrade process to transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the
new appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface of the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance to transfer the data
from the old appliance and set up the services.

Results

The newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance 8.0 is running on the target server but is
not configured.

Important The data from the source vCenter Server is not transferred and the services of the
target appliance are not started.

What to do next

Transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter
Server Appliance. See Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High
Availability Cluster.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Stage 2 - Transfer Data and Set-Up the Newly Deployed vCenter High
Availability Cluster
When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the upgrade process to
transfer the data from the old appliance and start the services of the newly deployed vCenter
Server appliance. When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high availability protection.

Prerequisites

Understand the data migration options available to you when upgrading or migrating to a
vCenter Server appliance with an embedded PostgreSQL database. You can select to migrate
historical and other types of data in the background after deploying and starting vCenter Server.
See Transferring Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the upgrade process and click Next.

2 Wait for the pre-upgrade check to finish and read the pre-upgrade check result if any.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains error messages, read the messages and click
Logs to export and download a support bundle for troubleshooting.

You cannot proceed with the upgrade until you have corrected the errors.

Important If you have provided incorrect vCenter Single Sign-On user name and
password of the source appliance during stage 1, the pre-upgrade check fails with an
authentication error.

n If the pre-upgrade check result contains warning messages, read the messages and click
Close.

After you have verified that your system meets the requirements from the warning
message, you can proceed with the upgrade.

3 Specify the replication topology for the vCenter Server. When converging vCenter Server
instance with an external Platform Services Controller you must specify the replication
topology.

Convergence is the process of converting a vCenter Server instance with an external Platform
Services Controller to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the
appliance.
n This is the first vCenter Server in the topology that I want to converge.

n This is a subsequent vCenter Server.

If this is a subsequent vCenter Server, provide the IP address of its partner vCenter Server
and its HTTPS port.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

4 On the Select migration data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from
the old appliance to the new, upgraded appliance.

A large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance. For the
minimum upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, select to transfer
only the configuration data. If you are using an external Oracle database, you can also
choose to migrate historical and performance metrics data in the background after you
deploy and start the new vCenter Server appliance.

5 On the Ready to complete page, review the upgrade settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

6 Read the shutdown warning message and click OK.

7 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish and click OK to go to the vCenter
Server Getting Started page.

Results

The vCenter Server appliance is upgraded. The old vCenter Server appliance is powered off and
the new appliance starts.

After the Active node is upgraded, a new Passive and Witness node is created using a clone
operation. These nodes are created automatically for Auto Deployment. For Manual Deployment,
nodes are not created automatically. You must clone the Passive and Witness VMs and set the
cluster mode to enabled.

When the deployment finishes, vCenter Server has high availability protection. You can click Edit
to enter Maintenance Mode, Deactivate, or Remove vCenter HA. You can also Initiate vCenter HA
failover.

What to do next

n Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.

n If the old vCenter Server appliance uses a non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group,
to preserve the port group setting, you can manually connect the new appliance to the
original non-ephemeral distributed virtual port group. For information about configuring
virtual machine networking on a vSphere distributed switch, see vSphere Networking.

n Upgrade all vCenter Server instances in the vCenter Single Sign-On domain.

n After converging a vCenter Server with external Platform Services Controller node tovCenter
Server Appliance, you must decommission the original external Platform Services Controller.
Decommissioning a Platform Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single
sign-on domain. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

n You can configure high availability for the vCenter Server appliance. For information about
providing vCenter Server appliance high availability, see vSphere Availability.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance

You can use the CLI installer to perform an unattended upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance on
an ESXi host or vCenter Server instance.

The CLI upgrade process includes downloading the vCenter Server appliance installer on a
network virtual machine or physical server from which you want to perform the upgrade,
preparing a JSON configuration file with the upgrade information, and running the upgrade
command.

Important The user name that you use to log in to the machine from which you want to
run the CLI upgrade, the path to the vCenter Server appliance ISO file, the path to your JSON
configuration file, and the string values in your JSON configuration file, including the passwords,
must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

The vCenter Server appliance ISO file contains templates of JSON files that contain the minimum
configuration parameters that are required for upgrading a vCenter Server appliance. For
information about preparing JSON templates for CLI upgrade of the vCenter Server appliance,
see Prepare Your JSON Configuration File for CLI Upgrade.

Note When you upgrade vCenter Server 6.7 or 7.0 with an external Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server 8.0, the upgrade process converges the external Platform Services
Controller into the new vCenter Server appliance. The new vCenter Server contains all Platform
Services Controller services, preserving the functionality and workflows, including authentication,
certificate management, and licensing. It is no longer necessary nor possible to upgrade and use
an external Platform Services Controller.

After successfully upgrading your environment to vCenter Server 8.0, the pre-existing Platform
Services Controller will be powered off, and you can remove it from your vSphere inventory. See
Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

Prepare Your JSON Configuration File for CLI Upgrade

Before you run the CLI command to upgrade a vCenter Server appliance, you must prepare a
JSON file with configuration parameters and their values for your upgrade specification.

The vCenter Server installer contains JSON templates for all upgrade types. For information
about the templates, see JSON Templates for CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance.

You can upgrade an appliance with minimum configurations by setting values to the
configuration parameters in the JSON template for your specification. You can edit the
preset values, remove configuration parameters, and add configuration parameters for custom
configurations.

For a complete list of the configuration parameters and their descriptions, navigate to
the installer subdirectory for your operating system and run the vcsa-deploy upgrade --
template-help command or see Upgrade Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of vCenter
Server Appliance .

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vCenter Server Upgrade

Prerequisites

n You must be familiar with the JSON syntax.

n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server Appliance installer, navigate to the vcsa-cli-installer directory,

and open the templates subfolder.

2 Copy the upgrade templates from the upgrade subfolder to your workspace.

Important The path to the JSON configuration files must contain only ASCII characters.
Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

3 Open the template file for your use case in a text editor.

To ensure the correct syntax of your JSON configuration file, use a JSON editor.

4 Fill in the values for the required configuration parameters and, optionally, enter additional
parameters and their values.

For example, if you want to use an IPv4 DHCP assignment for the temporary network of the
new appliance, in the temporary_network subsection of the template, change the value of the
mode parameter to dhcp and remove the default configuration parameters that are for a static
assignment.

"temporary_network": {
"ip_family": "ipv4",
"mode": "dhcp"
},

Important The string values, including the passwords, must contain only ASCII characters.
Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

To set a value that contains a backslash (\) or quotation mark (")

character, you must precede the character with the backslash (\) character. For
example, "password":"my\"password" sets the password my"password, "image":"G:\
\vcsa\\VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-6.7.0.XXXX-YYYYYYY_OVF10.ova" sets the path
G:\vcsa\VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-6.7.0.XXXX-YYYYYYY_OVF10.ova.

The Boolean values must contain only lowercase characters, that is, a value can be either
true or false. For example, "ssh_enable":false.

5 (Optional) Use a JSON editor of your choice to validate the JSON file.

6 Save in UTF-8 format and close the file.

What to do next

You can create and save additional templates if needed for your upgrade specification.

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vCenter Server Upgrade

JSON Templates for CLI Upgrade of the vCenter Server Appliance

The vCenter Server appliance installer contains JSON templates that are located in the vcsa-
cli-installer/templates directory. In the upgrade subfolder, you can find the JSON
templates with the minimum configuration parameters for all upgrade types.

For each upgrade type, there is one template for deploying the new appliance on an ESXi host
and another template for deploying the new appliance on a vCenter Server instance.

Table 3-5. Upgrade JSON Templates Included in the vCenter Server Appliance Installer

Location Template Description

vcsa-cli- embedded_vCSA_on_ESXi.json Contains the minimum configuration

installer\templates\upgrade\vc parameters that are required for
sa\6.7 upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 6.7 with an embedded
Platform Services Controller to
vCenter Server appliance 8.0 on an
ESXi host.

embedded_vCSA_on_VC.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters that are required for
upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 6.7 with an embedded
Platform Services Controller vCenter
Server appliance 8.0 on a vCenter
Server instance.

vCSA_on_ESXi.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters that are required for
upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 6.7 with an external
Platform Services Controller to
vCenter Server appliance8.0 on an
ESXi host.

vCSA_on_VC.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters that are required for
upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 6.7 with an external
Platform Services Controller to
vCenter Server appliance 8.0 on a
vCenter Server instance.

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Table 3-5. Upgrade JSON Templates Included in the vCenter Server Appliance Installer
(continued)

Location Template Description

vcsa-cli- embedded_vCSA_on_ESXi.json Contains the minimum configuration

installer\templates\upgrade\vc parameters that are required for
sa\7.0 upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 7.0 with an embedded
Platform Services Controller to
vCenter Server appliance 8.0 on an
ESXi host.

embedded_vCSA_on_VC.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters that are required for
upgrade of a vCenter Server
appliance 7.0 with an embedded
Platform Services Controller to
vCenter Server Appliance8.0 on a
vCenter Server instance.

About Upgrading a vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller

Using the CLI
When upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses an external Platform Services Controller,
it is converted to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the appliance. For
this reason, you must specify replication partner parameters in the JSON upgrade templates.

When upgrading a vCenter Server appliance that uses an external Platform Services Controller,
you must specify replication partner parameters in the JSON upgrade template. These
parameters indicate if the upgrade is for one of the following vCenter Server and Platform
Services Controller upgrade scenarios.

n A single vCenter Server and a single Platform Services Controller instance within an SSO
domain.

n The first vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller instance within an SSO domain
containing more than one vCenter Server.

n Replicating vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller instances within an SSO domain,
which you must point to an existing vCenter Server 7.0 instance as the replication partner.

Important It is not possible to upgrade an external Platform Services Controller. The upgrade
process converges the Platform Services Controller services into the vCenter Server appliance.
For more information, see Removal of Platform Services Controller.

Deployments using an external Platform Services Controller are often called an MxNdeployment,
where M represents the vCenter Server, and N represents the external Platform Services
Controller. When representing multiple instances of vCenter Server and Platform Services
Controller in a domain, this is expressed as MnxNn, where n is the number of instances. For

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example, M2xN2 indicates two vCenter Server instances and two Platform Services Controller
instances within the same domain. When upgrading such a deployment, you first upgrade one
instance to version 8.0, and then upgrade the second instance to 8.0, specifying the first of the
two instances as the replicating partner.

The replication parameters in the JSON upgrade template are located in the sso section of the
template, and are first_instance and replication_partner_hostname.

Parameter Name Description

first_instance The first_instance parameter identifies the vCenter

Server as either the first instance in your vCenter Server
SSO domain, or as a replicating partner.
If it is the first vCenter Server instance, set first_instance
to true For additional instances of vCenter Server in the
same SSO domain, set first_instance to false.

replication_partner_hostname* If you set first_instance to false, you must specify the

FQDN or IP address of a vCenter Server that has already
been upgraded to version 8.0, and whose external PSC has
been converged into the vCenter Server appliance.

When you perform the CLI upgrade of a single vCenter Server appliance that uses an external
Platform Services Controller, the process is as follows:

1 Upgrade the vCenter Server instance in your topology using the vCSA_on_ESXi.json template
when upgrading on ESXi, or the vCSA_on_VC.json template when upgrading on a vCenter
Server deployment.

2 For a deployment topology consisting of a single vCenter Server and a Platform Services
Controller (an M1xN1 deployment), edit the sso section of the template such that the
first_instance parameter is set to true, and remove the replication_partner_hostname
parameter.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the first instance (M1) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "true" and "replication_partner_hostname" removed.
],
"first_instance": true
}

3 Specify the remaining upgrade configuration parameters in the JSON template, and upgrade
vCenter Server to version 8.0 using the CLI. See Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance by
Using the CLI.

4 After successfully upgrading vCenter Server, decommission the Platform Services Controller.
See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

Important Decommission the Platform Services Controller instances only after upgrading
and converging all vCenter Server instances in your topology.

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For a deployment consisting of two or more vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller
instances (an M2xN2 deployment), you first upgrade the M1 vCenter Server instance to version
8.0, and then upgrade the second, replicating vCenter Server instance.

1 Upgrade the vCenter Server instances in your deployment using the vCSA_on_ESXi.json
template when upgrading on ESXi, or the vCSA_on_VC.json template when upgrading on a
vCenter Server deployment.

2 For the first vCenter Server instance (M1), edit the sso section of the template such that
the first_instance parameter is set to true, and remove the replication_partner_hostname
parameter.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the first instance (M1) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "true" and "replication_partner_hostname" removed.
],
"first_instance": true
}

3 For the remaining vCenter Server instance (M2), edit the sso section of the template such
that the first_instance parameter is set to false, and provide the FQDN or IP address of
the vCenter Server instance to which you want to replicate the second node. The replication
partner is the first vCenter Server instance (M1) you upgraded to version 8.0, which has been
converged with its Platform Services Controller instance.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the second instance (M2) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "false" and "replication_partner_hostname" set to the hostname of
the replication partner.],
"first_instance": false,
"replication_partner_hostname": "FQDN_or_IP_address"

4 Specify the remaining upgrade configuration parameters in the JSON templates, and finish
the upgrade using the CLI. See Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance by Using the CLI.

5 After successfully upgrading all vCenter Server instances in the topology, decommission the
Platform Services Controller instances. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

Important Decommission the Platform Services Controller instances only after upgrading
and converging all vCenter Server instances in your topology.

Upgrade Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of vCenter Server Appliance

When you prepare your JSON configuration files for CLI upgrade, you must set parameters and
values to provide input data for the upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance.

Sections and Subsections of Configuration Parameters in the JSON Upgrade Files

The configuration parameters in the JSON configuration files for CLI upgrade are organized in
sections and subsections.

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Table 3-6. Sections and Subsections of Configuration Parameters in the JSON Upgrade Files

Section Subsection Description

new_vcsa - describes the esxi Use only if you want to deploy the new appliance directly on an ESXi
new appliance that you host.
want to deploy. Contains the configuration parameters that describe the target ESXi
host. See Table 3-7. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section,
esxi Subsection.

Note You must fill in either this subsection or the vc subsection.

vc Use only if you want to deploy the new appliance on the inventory of a
vCenter Server instance.
Contains the configuration parameters that describe the target ESXi
host or DRS cluster from the vCenter Server inventory. See Table 3-8.
Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection.

Note You must fill in either this subsection or the esxi subsection.

The target vCenter Server instance cannot be the vCenter Server

Appliance that you want to upgrade. In such cases, use the esxi
subsection.

appliance Contains the configuration parameters that describe the new appliance.
See Table 3-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section,
appliance Subsection

os Contains only the ssh_enable configuration parameter to set the SSH

administrator login to the new appliance.

ovftool_argume Optional. Use this subsection for adding arbitrary arguments and their
nts values to the OVF Tool command that the installer generates.

Important The vCenter Server appliance installer does not validate the
configuration parameters in the ovftool_arguments subsection. If you
set arguments that the OVF Tool does not recognize, the deployment
might fail.

temporary_netw Contains the configuration parameters that describe the temporary

ork network settings for the new appliance. See Table 3-10. Configuration
Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, temporary_network Subsection

user_options Contains only the vcdb_migrateSet configuration parameter to set the

types of data that you want to transfer from the old appliance to
the new appliance. See Table 3-11. Configuration Parameters in the
new_vcsa Section, user_options Subsection

source_vc - describes managing_esxi_ Contains the configuration parameters that describe the source ESXi
the existing appliance or_vc host or vCenter Server appliance instance on which resides the
that you want to appliance that you want to upgrade. See Table 3-13. Configuration
upgrade. Parameters in the source_vc Section, managing_esxi_or_vc Subsection.

vc_vcsa Contains the configuration parameters that describe the source

appliance that you want to upgrade. See Table 3-14. Configuration
Parameters in the source_vc Section, vc_vcsa Subsection.

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Table 3-6. Sections and Subsections of Configuration Parameters in the JSON Upgrade Files
(continued)

Section Subsection Description

source_vum - describes run_migration_ Optional if the source vCenter Server appliance that you want to
the source VMware assistant upgrade is connected to a VMware Update Manager instance that
Update Manager runs on a Windows virtual machine. Use this subsection if you want
instance. to automatically run Migration Assistant on the source VMware Update
Use if you want Manager instance.
to automatically run Contains the configuration parameters that describe the source VMware
Migration Assistant on Update Manager instance, which will be migrated to the new upgraded
the VMware Update vCenter Server appliance. See Table 3-15. Configuration Parameters in
Manager instance. the source_vum Section, run_migration_assistant Subsection.

Note The Migration Assistant uses port 9123 by default. If port 9123
is used by another service on the Update Manager machine, Migration
Assistant automatically finds another free port. You cannot set a custom
port for Migration Assistant.

ceip - describes joining settings Contains only the ceip_enabled configuration parameter to join or not
the VMware Customer to join the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP).
Experience Improvement See Table 3-16. Configuration Parameters in the ceip Section, settings
Program (CEIP). Subsection.
Required only if you are upgrading a vCenter Server appliance with an
embedded Platform Services Controller or a Platform Services Controller
appliance.

Note If the ceip_enabled configuration parameter is set to true, you

must run the CLI deployment command with the --acknowledge-ceip
argument.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer

Experience Improvement Program section in vCenter Server and Host
Management.

Important The string values, including the passwords, must contain only ASCII characters.
Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

To set a value that contains a backslash (\) or quotation mark (") character,
you must precede the character with the backslash (\) character. For example,
"password":"my\"password" sets the password my"password, "image":"G:\\vcsa\\VMware-
vCenter-Server-Appliance-8.0.0.XXXX-YYYYYYY_OVF10.ova" sets the path G:\vcsa\VMware-
vCenter-Server-Appliance-8.0.0.XXXX-YYYYYYY_OVF10.ova.

The Boolean values must contain only lowercase characters. Can be either true or false. For
example, "ssh_enable":false.

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Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section

Table 3-7. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, esxi Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the target ESXi host on which you want to deploy
the new appliance.

username string A user name with administrative privileges on the target ESXi host, for
example, root.

password string The password of the user with administrative privileges on the target ESXi
host.

deployment_network string The name of the network to which to connect the new appliance.
The network must be part of the target ESXi host or vCenter Server appliance
instance (as identified by the managing_esxi_or_vc configuration parameter)
network configuration.

Note The network must be accessible from the source ESXi host or
vCenter Server appliance instance (as identified by the managing_esxi_or_vc
configuration parameter) on which resides the appliance that you want to
upgrade. The network must be also accessible from the client machine from
which you are performing the upgrade.

Ignored if the target ESXi host has only one network.

datastore string The name of the datastore on which to store the virtual machine configuration
files and virtual disks of the new appliance.
The datastore must be available to the target ESXi host.

Note The datastore must have at least 25 GB of free space.

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Table 3-7. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, esxi Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

port integer The HTTPS reverse proxy port of the target ESXi host.
The default port is 443. Use only if the target ESXi host uses a custom HTTPS
reverse proxy port.

ssl_certificate_verifi string The CLI verifies that a server's security certificate is signed by a Certificate
cation Authority (CA), and establishes a secure connection. If the certificate is self-
signed, the CLI stops the upgrade unless you specify one of the following SSL
certificate configuration options:
Specify the Secure Hash Algorithm 1 (SHA-1) certificate thumbprint. A
certificate thumbprint is a hexadecimal string that uniquely identifies a
certificate. The thumbprint is calculated from the content of the certificate
using a thumbprint algorithm.

"thumbprint": "certificate SHA-1 thumbprint"

Set verification_mode to NONE.

"verification_mode": "NONE"

If you are connecting to a server with a self-signed certificate, and fail to either
specify the SHA-1 certificate thumbprint or set the verification mode to NONE,
the CLI displays the server's self-signed certificate thumbprint, and prompts
you to accept or reject the certificate thumbprint.
You may also specify that the CLI ignore the self-signed using the vcsa-
deploy upgrade command parameter --no-ssl-certificate-validation.
See Syntax of the CLI Upgrade Command .

Table 3-8. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the target vCenter Server instance on which you
want to deploy the new appliance.

username string vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name on the target vCenter Server
instance, for example, administrator@vsphere.local.

password string The password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user on the target
vCenter Server instance.

deployment_network string The name of the network to which to connect the new appliance.
The network must part of the target ESXi host or DRS cluster network
configuration.

Note The network must be accessible from the source ESXi host on
which resides the appliance that you want to upgrade. The network must be
also accessible from the client machine from which you are performing the
upgrade.

Ignored if the target ESXi host or DRS cluster has only one network.

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Table 3-8. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

datacenter array The vCenter Server data center that contains the target ESXi host or DRS
cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance.
If the data center is located in a folder or a structure of folders, specify the as
a comma-separated list of strings. For example,

["parent_folder", "child_folder", "datacenter_name"]

If there is no folder path on the data center, then use only the data center
name. For example,

["datacenter_name"]

or

"datacenter_name"

Note The value is case-sensitive.

datastore string The name of the datastore that you want to store all virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks of the new appliance.

Note The datastore must be available to the target ESXi host or DRS cluster.

The datastore must have at least 25 GB of free space.

port integer The HTTPS reverse proxy port of the target vCenter Server instance.
The default port is 443. Use only if the target vCenter Server instance uses a
custom HTTPS reverse proxy port.

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Table 3-8. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

target array The target cluster, ESXi host, or resource pool on which you want to deploy
the new appliance. This is the target you specified with the datacenter
parameter. This path must end with a cluster name, ESXi hostname, or
resource pool name.

Important You must provide the name that is displayed in the vCenter Server
inventory. For example, if the name of the target ESXi host is an IP address in
the vCenter Server inventory, you cannot provide an FQDN.

Note All values are case-sensitive.

If you want the deployed appliance to be listed in a different location within

the data center's hierarchy, use the vm_folder parameter described later in
this section.
If the target cluster, ESXi host, or resource pool is located in a folder or a
structure of folders, specify the value as a comma-separated list of strings. For
example,

["parent_folder", "child_folder", "esxi-host.domain.com"]

If the target ESXi host is part of a cluster, specify the path as a comma-
separated list of strings. For example,

["cluster_name","esxi-host.domain.com"]

If you are deploying to a resource pool, include the label Resources before
the resource pool name. For example:

["cluster_name", "Resources", "resource_pool_name"]

Note Pre-checks verify only the memory of the resource pool.

vm_folder string Optional. The name of the virtual machine (VM) folder to which to add the new
appliance.

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Table 3-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, appliance Subsection

Name Type Description

thin_disk_mode Boolean Set to true to deploy the new appliance with thin virtual disks.

deployment_option string The size for the new appliance.

Note You must consider the database size of the appliance that you want to
upgrade. For an external database, see Determine the Oracle Database Size
and the Storage Size for the New Appliance.

n Set to tiny if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to 10

hosts and 100 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 300 GB of

storage.
n Set to tiny-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for
up to 10 hosts and 100 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 825 GB of

storage.
n Set to tiny-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 10 hosts and 100 virtual machines with the x-large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 1700 GB of

storage.
n Set to small if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 340 GB of

storage.
n Set to small-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 870 GB of

storage.
n Set to small-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 1750 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 525 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 1025 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 1905 GB of

storage.

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Table 3-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, appliance Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

n Set to large if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to

1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 740 GB of

storage.
n Set to large-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 1090 GB of

storage.
n Set to large-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 1970 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 1180 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 1230 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 2110 GB of

storage.
n Set to management-tiny if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
with an external Platform Services Controller for up to 10 hosts and 100
virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 300 GB of

storage.

image string Optional. A local file path or URL to the vCenter Server appliance installation
package.
By default the installer uses the installation package that is included in the ISO
file, in the vcsa folder.

name string The VM name for the new appliance.

Must contain only ASCII characters except a percent sign (%), backslash (\), or
forward slash (/) and must be no more than 80 characters in length.

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Table 3-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, appliance Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

ovftool_path string Optional. A local file path to the OVF Tool executable file.
By default the installer uses the OVF Tool instance that is included in the ISO
file, in the vcsa/ovftool folder.

license string Optional. License key to be applied to the appliance. If the license key is not
provided, evaluation license will be used.

Table 3-10. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, temporary_network Subsection

Name Type Description

ip_family string IP version for the temporary network of the new appliance.
Set to ipv4 or ipv6.

mode string IP assignment for the temporary network of the new appliance.
Set to static or dhcp.

ip string Temporary IP address for the new appliance.

Required only if you use a static assignment, that is, if you set the mode
parameter to static.
You must set an IPv4 or IPv6 address that corresponds to the temporary
network IP version, that is, to the value of the ip.family parameter.
An IPv4 address must comply with the RFC 790 guidelines.
An IPv6 address must comply with the RFC 2373 guidelines.

dns_servers string or IP addresses of one or more DNS servers for the temporary network of the
array new appliance.
To set more than one DNS server, use a comma-separated list of strings or a
comma-separated list as a single string to provide the path. For example,

["x.y.z.a", "x.y.z.b"]

or

"x.y.z.a, x.y.z.b"

Required only if you use static network mode for the temporary IP address
allocation, that is, if you set the mode parameter to static.

prefix string Network prefix length for the temporary network of the new appliance.
Use only if the mode parameter is set to static. Remove if the mode parameter
is set to dhcp.
The network prefix length is the number of bits that are set in the subnet
mask. For example, if the subnet mask is 255.255.255.0, there are 24 bits in
the binary version of the prefix length, so the network prefix length is 24.
For IPv4 version, the value must be between 0 and 32.
For IPv6 version, the value must be between 0 and 128.

gateway string IP address of the default gateway for the temporary network of the new
appliance.
For IPv6 version, the value can be default.

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Table 3-11. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, user_options Subsection

Name Type Description

vcdb_migrateSet string Select the types of data to migrate from the old appliance to the new
appliance. Data is copied from the source vCenter Server to the target server.
The original source of the data remains unchanged.
n Set to core if you want to transfer only the configuration data. This
option provides the fastest data migration, keeping system downtime to
a minimum.
n Set to core_events_tasks if you want to transfer the configuration and
historical data (events and tasks) immediately. vCenter Server will not start
until all data has been migrated from the source vCenter Server appliance.
n Set to all if you want to transfer the configuration, historical, and
performance metrics data immediately. vCenter Server will not start until
all data has been migrated from the source vCenter Server for Windows.
This option transfers the largest amount of data, and requires more
downtime than other data migration options.

Note To minimize the upgrade time and the amount of storage required for
the new vCenter Server appliance, use the core value.

For more information on the types of data you can transfer from your
existingvCenter Server to the new, upgradedvCenter Server, see Transferring
Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Table 3-12. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, sso Subsection

Name Type Description

first_instance string Set first_instance to true if this is the first converge upgrade operation in
your vCenter Server SSO domain, or if you do not want to set the replication
partner for this node.
If you want to set the replication partner for this node, set first_instance
to false and provide the value of the replication_partner_hostname as the
FQDN of a previously converged node which is currently in an embedded
vCenter Server topology.
For more information on specifying the first_instance and
replication_partner_hostname parameters, see About Upgrading a vCenter
Server with an External Platform Services Controller Using the CLI.

replication_partner_ho string Host name of the replication partner. Remove if it is the first_instance.
stname

Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section

Table 3-13. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, managing_esxi_or_vc Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the source ESXi or vCenter Server host on which
resides the appliance that you want to upgrade.

username string A user name with administrative privileges on the source ESXi host, for
example, root.

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Table 3-13. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, managing_esxi_or_vc Subsection

(continued)

Name Type Description

password string The password of the user with administrative privileges on the source ESXi
host.

port integer The HTTPS reverse proxy port of the source ESXi host.
The default port is 443. Use only if the source ESXi host uses a custom HTTPS
reverse proxy port.

Table 3-14. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, vc_vcsa Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the source appliance that you want to upgrade.

username string vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user on the source appliance, for
example administrator@vsphere.local.

Important The user must be administrator@your_domain_name.

password string The password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user on the source
appliance.

root_password string The password for the root user of the operating system of the source
appliance.

export_dir string Directory to export source configuration and data.

Configuration Parameters in the source.vum Section

Table 3-15. Configuration Parameters in the source_vum Section, run_migration_assistant

Subsection

Name Type Description

esxi_hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the ESXi host on which resides the source VMware
Update Manager instance.
If an FQDN is provided, it must be resolvable from the client machine from
which you run the upgrade.

esxi_username string A user name with administrative privileges on the ESXi host, for example, root.

esxi_password string The password of the user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host.

esxi_port string The HTTPS reverse proxy port of the ESXi host.
The default port is 443. Use only if the ESXi host uses a custom HTTPS reverse
proxy port.

vum_hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the Windows virtual machine on which the source
VMware Update Manager instance runs.
If an FQDN is provided, it must be resolvable from the client machine from
which you run the upgrade.

vum_os_username string The administrator user name of the Windows virtual machine on which the
source VMware Update Manager instance runs.

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Table 3-15. Configuration Parameters in the source_vum Section, run_migration_assistant

Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

vum_os_password string The administrator password of the Windows virtual machine on which the
source VMware Update Manager instance runs.
If not provided, you are prompted to enter the password at the command
console during the template verification.

export_dir string Directory to export source configuration and data.

Configuration Parameters in the ceip Section

Table 3-16. Configuration Parameters in the ceip Section, settings Subsection

Name Type Description

ceip_enabled Boolean Set to true to join the CEIP for the new upgraded appliance.

Upgrade a vCenter Server Appliance by Using the CLI

You can use the CLI installer to perform an unattended upgrade of a vCenter Server appliance or
Platform Services Controller appliance. You must run the CLI upgrade from a Windows, Linux, or
Mac machine that is in the same network as the appliance that you want to upgrade.

Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Upgrading the vCenter Server Appliance.

n Prepare Your JSON Configuration File for CLI Upgrade.

n Review the arguments for running the CLI upgrade. See Syntax of the CLI Upgrade
Command.

n Verify that the user name with which you are logged in to your machine, the path to the
vCenter Server appliance installer, the path to your JSON configuration file, and the string
values in your JSON configuration file contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and
non-ASCII characters are not supported.

Procedure

1 Navigate to the vcsa-cli-installer subdirectory for your operating system.

n If you are running the upgrade on Windows, navigate to the vcsa-cli-

installer\win32 directory.

n If you are running the upgrade on Linux, navigate to the vcsa-cli-installer/lin64

directory.

n If you are running the upgrade on Mac, navigate to the vcsa-cli-installer/mac

directory.

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2 (Optional) Verify that you prepared the upgrade template correctly by running a basic
template verification.

vcsa-deploy upgrade --verify-template-only path_to_the_json_file

3 (Optional) Gather and validate the upgrade requirements by running a pre-upgrade check.

vcsa-deploy upgrade --precheck-only path_to_the_json_file

The pre-upgrade check installs the Upgrade Runner on the source appliance that you want to
upgrade without upgrading the appliance.

The Upgrade Runner validates the configurations such as ESXi, network settings, and NTP
servers. The Upgrade Runner also checks if you have selected a suitable deployment size and
storage size for the new appliance against the compute resources required for the upgrade.

4 Perform the upgrade by running the following command.

vcsa-deploy upgrade --accept-eula optional_arguments path_to_the_json_file

Use optional_arguments to enter space-separated arguments to set additional execution

parameters of the upgrade command.
For example, you can set the location of the log and other output files that the installer
generates. This example also confirms participation in the VMware Customer Experience
Improvement Program (CEIP). If the ceip_enabled parameter is set to true in the JSON
deployment template, you must include the argument --acknowledge-ceip.

vcsa-deploy upgrade --accept-eula --acknowledge-ceip --log-dir=path_to_the_location

path_to_the_json_file

What to do next

Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.

Syntax of the CLI Upgrade Command

You can use command arguments to set the execution parameters of the upgrade command.

You can add a space-separated list of arguments to the CLI upgrade command.

vcsa-deploy upgrade path_to_the_json_file list_of_arguments

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Argument Description

--accept-eula Accepts the end-user license agreement.

Required for executing the deployment command.

--acknowledge-ceip Confirms your acknowledgement of your VMware

Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP)
participation.
Required if the ceip_enabled parameter is set to true in
the JSON deployment template.

-v, --verbose Adds debug information to the console output.

-t, --terse Hides the console output. Displays only warning and error
messages.

--log-dir LOG_DIR Specifies the location of the log and other output files that
the installer generates.

--skip-ovftool-verification Performs basic verification of the configuration

parameters and deploys the vCenter Server appliance,
but does not validate the OVF Tool parameters in the
ovftool_arguments subsection of the JSON template. If
you set arguments that the OVF Tool does not recognize,
the deployment might fail.

--no-ssl-certificate-verification Prohibits SSL verification of for all server connections.

The CLI verifies that a server's security certificate is
signed by a Certificate Authority (CA), and establishes
a secure connection. If the certificate is self-signed,
the CLI stops the upgrade unless you specify that the
CLI ignore the self-signed certificate using the --no-ssl-
certificate-verification command parameter.

If you are connecting to a server with a self-signed

certificate, and fail to specify that the CLI accept it, the
CLI displays the server's self-signed certificate thumbprint,
and prompts you to accept or reject it.
You can also specify that the CLI ignore self-signed
certificates using the ssl_certificate_verification
configuration parameter in the JSON template. See
Upgrade Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of
vCenter Server Appliance .

Important Avoid using this option as it may cause

problems during or after upgrade due to an un-validated
identity of the target host.

--operation-id Lets you provide an identifier to track the concurrent

installation, migration, or upgrade of multiple vCenter
Server instances. If do not provide an operation ID, the
CLI generates a universally unique identifier (UUID) which
you can use to identify the different instances of vCenter
Server and their installation or upgrade status.

--pause-on-warnings Pauses and waits for acknowledgment of warnings.

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Argument Description

--verify-template-only Performs basic template verification without installing

Upgrade Runner, running prechecks, and upgrading or
migrating the vCenter Server Appliance.

--precheck-only Installs Upgrade Runner on the source appliance and

runs a complete set of prechecks without performing the
upgrade.

-h, --help Displays the help message for the vcsa-deploy upgrade
command.

--template-help Displays the help message for the use of configuration

parameters in the JSON upgrade file.

After the execution finishes, you can get the exit code of the command.

Exit Code Description

0 Command ran successfully

1 Runtime error

2 Validation error

3 Template error

Reduced Downtime Upgrade

Reduced downtime upgrade is a migration-based approach to upgrade vCenter Server between
major and minor versions that reduces downtime to less than 5 minutes under ideal network,
CPU, memory, and storage conditions.

You can perform a reduced downtime upgrade for single self-managed vCenter Server instances,
vCenter Server instances managed by another vCenter Server, vCenter Server instances
enabled with vCenter HA, and vCenter Server instances connected in Enhanced Linked Mode
configuration.

Supported Upgrade Paths

Source Version Target Version

vSphere 8.0 vSphere 8.0 Update 2 or later

vSphere 8.0 Update 1 vSphere 8.0 Update 2 or later

vSphere 8.0 P02 vSphere 8.0 Update 2 or later

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Source Version Target Version

vSphere 8.0 Update 2 Releases later than vSphere 8.0 Update 2

vSphere 8.0 Update 2 with vSphere High Availability vSphere 8.0 Update 3 and later releases.
(vSphere HA)

Note Reduced downtime upgrade is not available for

vCenter HA clusters of versions earlier than vSphere 8.0
Update 2 and for vCenter HA clusters that are manually
configured.

About the Reduced Downtime Upgrade Process

The reduced downtime upgrade process uses a migration-based approach. In this approach,
a new vCenter Server Appliance is deployed and the current vCenter data and configuration
is copied to it. The reduced downtime upgrade does not replace the current vCenter Server
upgrade process through the GUI installer.

During the reduced downtime upgrade process, the source vCenter Server Appliance and all
resources remain online. The downtime occurs when the source vCenter Server Appliance is
stopped, the configuration is switched over to the target vCenter, and the services are started.
The downtime is expected to take less than 5 minutes under ideal network, CPU, memory, and
storage provisioning.

The high-level steps for the reduced downtime upgrade are:

1 Configure the repository URL.

Note Perform this step when you are upgrading from versions earlier than vSphere 8.0
Update 2 to vSphere 8.0 Update 2.

Go to Step 2 if you are upgrading from vSphere 8.0 Update 2 to later versions.

2 Download and mount the ISO.

3 Verify that you have a backup of the source vCenter Server Appliance.

4 Upgrade the vCenter Server Life-cycle Manager service plug-in and run prechecks.

5 Configure the target vCenter Server Appliance.

6 Prepare the upgrade and and switch over to the target vCenter Server Appliance.

Prechecks are run at every stage of the process. If you face issues, resolve the issue and retry
the upgrade steps. If the upgrade is canceled or an error occurs at any stage, the configuration
reverts to the source vCenter instance. The source vCenter instance does not shut down until the
upgrade process is complete and the target vCenter is up and running.

Note In the event of a failure, the upgrade process is cancelled automatically and the
configuration reverts to the source vCenter instance. The vCenter Lifecycle plug-in does not
revert.

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Configure Repository URL

You can configure the vCenter Server Appliance to use the default or a custom repository URL as
a source for ISO images. By default the current repository for URL-based patching is the default
VMware repository URL

If vCenter Server is not connected to the Internet or if your security policy does not allow you to
connect to the Internet, you can build and configure a custom repository. The custom repository
runs on a local Web server within your data center and replicates the data from the default
repository.

Note You must perform this procedure when you are upgrading from versions earlier than
vSphere 8.0 Update 2 to vSphere 8.0 Update 2.

Prerequisites

Log in to the vCenter Server Appliance Appliance Management Interface as root.

Procedure

1 If you want to configure a custom repository URL, build the repository on your local web
server.

a Log in to VMware Customer Connect at https://customerconnect.vmware.com/

downloads/#all_products.

b Select Download Product under VMware vSphere.

c Select the vCenter Server version from the Select Version drop-down.

d Against your license type, click GO TO DOWNLOADS in the row for VMware vCenter
Server.

e Download the VMware vCenter Server Appliance Update Bundle ZIP file.

f Confirm that the md5sum is correct by using an MD5 checksum tool.

g On your Web server, create a repository directory under the root.

For example, create the vc_update_repo directory.

h Extract the ZIP file into the repository directory.

The extracted files are in the manifest and package-pool subdirectories.

2 In the vCenter Server Management Interface, click Update.

3 Click Settings.

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4 Select the Repository settings.

Option Description

Default Uses the default VMware repository URL that is preset for the build profile
of the appliance.

Specified Uses a custom repository. You must enter the repository URL, for example,
https://web_server_name.your_company.com/vc_update_repo.
The repository URL must use a secure protocol such as HTTPS or FTPS.

5 (Optional) If the specified repository requires authentication, enter the user name and
password.

6 If you do not want to perform a security certificate check, deselect the Check Certificate
check box.

If you trust the URL for the repository, you can choose to bypass the certificate check for the
repository URL.

7 Click SAVE.

In the Current version details pane, you can view the vCenter Server version and build
number.

Download and Mount the ISO Image

VMware releases the vCenter Server Appliance ISO image, which contains the installers for the
vCenter Server Appliance.

n Download the ISO image to the content library or datastore connected to the vCenter virtual
machine or the managing vCenter.

n Mount the ISO image on the CD-ROM device of the vCenter Server virtual machine.

Prerequisites

n Create a Customer Connect account at https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/.

n Verify that you have the following privileges:

n Virtual machine .Interaction.Configure CD media on the virtual machine.

n Datastore.Browse datastore on the datastore to which you upload the installation media
ISO image.

n Datastore.Low level file operations on the datastore to which you upload the installation
media ISO image.

Procedure

1 Log in to VMware Customer Connect.

2 Go to Products and Accounts > All Products.

3 Find VMware vSphere and click View Download Components.

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4 Select a VMware vSphere version from the Select Version drop-down.

5 Select a version of VMware vCenter Server and click GO TO DOWNLOADS.

6 Download the vCenter Server Appliance ISO image.

7 Right-click a virtual machine in the vCenter Server inventory and select Edit Settings.

8 Expand CD/DVD drive, and select Datastore ISO File from the drop-down menu.

The Select File dialog box opens.

9 Browse to select the file that you downloaded and click OK.

10 From the Virtual Device Node drop-down menu, select the node that the drive uses in the
virtual machine.

11 Select Connect At Power On to connect the device when the virtual machine powers on.

12 Click OK.

13 Expand the VM Hardware panel and click the Connected icon next to the datastore ISO file to
connect the device.

Upgrade the vCenter Lifecycle Plug-in

After you download and mount the ISO image, upgrade the vCenter Lifecycle plug-in.

n Concurrent upgrades are not supported.

n Perform steps 3-5 if you are upgrading from a version earlier than vSphere 8.0 Update 2.

n If you are upgrading from version vSphere 8.0 Update 2 or later versions, you can mount the
ISO file and upgrade the plug-in.

Prerequisites

n Verify that you have downloaded and mounted the ISO image. See Download and Mount the
ISO Image.

n Log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface as root.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client, select the vCenter Server that you want to upgrade.

2 On the Updates tab, click Update Planner.

3 Click Target Version and SELECT VERSION.

4 Select the version and click OK.

5 Click NEXT.

6 In Backup, select the check box to indicate that you have backed up the vCenter Server.

The backups are listed.

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7 In Upgrade Plug-in, select UPGRADE PLUG-IN to update the vCenter Lifecycle service plug-
in.

After the plug-in upgrades, the UI reloads with the version from the ISO file.

8 Click NEXT to proceed with configuring the target vCenter Server Appliance.

Warning Clicking NEXT before the upgrade completes might result in crash of the plug-in.
Wait for the progress bar to reach 100% before you click NEXT.

9 Click RUN PRECHECKS to run source prechecks and click NEXT.

10 (Optional) Click DISCARD to discard the upgrade workflow and return to the mount the ISO
step. The vCenter Lifecycle plug-in does not revert.

Configure the Target vCenter Server Appliance

When the vCenter Lifecycle service plug-in update completes, configure the target vCenter
Server Appliance.

After the upgrade, the target vCenter Server has the same IP address and identity as the source
vCenter Server.

Procedure

1 In Upgrade, go to the Target Appliance section.

2 Click CONFIGURE TARGET APPLIANCE.

The Target VM deployment wizard appears.

3 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

4 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose if
you want to join the program.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

5 Click Next.

6 Enter location details if the source vCenter Server is managed by another vCenter Server.

Enter the container location, HTTPS port, user name,and password of the source vCenter
Server.

7 View and accept the certificate of the source vCenter Server and click Next.

8 Select where you want to deploy the target vCenter Server Appliance and click Next.

You can deploy the target vCenter Server Appliance on the same location as the source
appliance or choose a different location. If you select a different location, the target location
must be a different vCenter Server and you must enter the connection details such as, host
name or IP address, HTTPS port, user name, and password of the vCenter Server.

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The Deployment Type page is displayed if you choose to deploy the target on the same
location as the source vCenter Server Appliance.

9 If you select a different location for the target vCenter Server, view and accept the certificate
and click Next.

10 Select the deployment type of the target vCenter Server Appliance and click Next.

Select Same configuration to deploy the target vCenter Server Appliance with same
configuration as the source.
Select Detailed configuration to enter all the configuration parameters for the target
appliance.
a Enter the data center or virtual machine folder where you want to deploy the target
vCenter Server Appliance.

b Select the compute resource required for the target deployment.

c Click Next.

11 Configure the target VM appliance details and click Next.

Enter the VM name and set and confirm the temporary root password.

12 Select a deployment size and storage size for the target vCenter Server and click Next.

13 Select a datastore for the deployment and click Next.

Optionally, enable thin provisioning.

14 In the Network Settings page, enter a temporary IP address of the target vCenter Server for
static deployments.

This IP address is used during the deployment of the target vCenter Server Appliance, during
upgrade and for switchover.
If the temporary IP address mode is DHCP, you do not need to enter the IP address.

15 In the Review page, review the configuration and click FINISH.

The Target Appliance section under the Upgrade window appears.

16 To change the settings, click Edit configuration and make the changes required.

17 Click Next to proceed with the upgrade and switchover.

18 Click DISCARD to discard the upgrade workflow and return to the mount the ISO step. The
vCenter Lifecycle plug-in does not revert.

You cannot discard the configuration when the upgrade is progress.

Prepare Upgrade and Switch Over to the Target vCenter Server

Appliance
Once the target vCenter Server Appliance is configured, you can upgrade and switch over the
services to it.

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The upgrade and switchover happen in two stages. The first stage is the preparation stage
where the upgrade is initialized and the target vCenter Server Appliance is created with the
configuration that you entered. During this stage, data from the source machine is replicated on
the target machine and the time taken for the process depends on the environment and vCenter
usage. The second stage is the switchover stage where the target vCenter Server Appliance
takes the identity of the source. During the switchover, there is a short downtime. You can select
manual or automatic switchover.

Procedure

1 In Update Planner, go to the Upgrade section.

2 Select the type of switchover you want to perform.

n Manual Switchover. Select this option if want to manually switch over to the target
vCenter Server Appliance. You must click SWITCHOVER to trigger the switchover after
the target appliance is created with the selected configuration.

n Automated Switchover. Select this option to continue with an automatic switchover after
the target appliance is created with the selected configuration.

3 Click START UPGRADE

You can see the progress of the prepare stage. When the prepare stage completes and
switchover starts and you can see the status of the switchover stage.
After the switchover completes, you can log in to the target vCenter Server Appliance.

4 Click OPEN VSPHERE CLIENT to log in.

If the upgrade fails, the configuration reverts to the source vCenter Server Appliance.

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Migrating vCenter Server for
Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance
4
You can migrate a vCenter Server installation on Windows to a vCenter Server appliance
installation while upgrading to version 8.0.

Read the following topics next:

n How to Migrate from vCenter Server on Windows to vCenter Server Appliance

n System Requirements for Migrating vCenter Server Deployments to vCenter Server Appliance
Deployments

n Pre-migration Checks

n Known Limitations

n Preparing for Migration

n Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server

n Required Information for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to an Appliance

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an Embedded Platform Services Controller to an

vCenter Server Appliance

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller to an Appliance

n CLI Migration of a vCenter Server Installation from Windows to an Appliance

How to Migrate from vCenter Server on Windows to vCenter

Server Appliance
VMware provides supported paths for migrating from vCenter Server version 6.7 installations on
Windows to vCenter Server Appliance 8.0 installations.

You can migrate the following deployments:

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Table 4-1. Supported vSphere Migration Paths

Source Configuration Target Configuration

vCenter Server 6.7 with an embedded Platform Services

Controller instance on Windows
vCenter Server Appliance 8.0
vCenter Server 6.7 instance on Windows

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Figure 4-1. High-level Tasks for vCenter Server on Windows Migration to vCenter Server
Appliance 8.0

Start vCenter Server on

Windows migration

Verify migration requirements

Prepare for migration

Embedded What is your External

deployment type?

Run Migration Assistant on the Run Migration Assistant

source vCenter Server. Leave on the source
it open during migration Platform Services Controller.
Leave it open during migration

Migrate the vCenter Server Migrate the

instance to an appliance Platform Services Controller
instance to an appliance

Run Migration Assistant on the

source vCenter Server. Leave it
open during migration

Perform Migrate the vCenter Server

post-migration tasks instance to an appliance

Migration is complete

You can use the GUI method or the CLI method to migrate your vCenter Server installation from
Windows to an appliance.

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an Embedded Platform Services Controller to an

vCenter Server Appliance

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller to an Appliance

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n CLI Migration of a vCenter Server Installation from Windows to an Appliance

Important You cannot change your deployment type during migration.

Migration of Update Manager from Windows to a vCenter Server

Appliance 8.0
For vSphere 6.7 and later releases, Update Manager is delivered as a 64-bit application and
can be installed only on a 64-bit Windows operating system. In vSphere 6.7, Update Manager
is provided as an optional service in vCenter Server Appliance 6.7. VMware provides supported
paths for migrating Update Manager from a Windows operating system to a vCenter Server
appliance version 8.0. In vSphere 8.0, Update Manager functionality is delivered as part of
vSphere Lifecycle Manager.

You can migrate Update Manager in the following vCenter Server deployments:

Table 4-2. Supported Migration Paths for Update Manager That Runs on Windows to a vCenter
Server Appliance

Source Configuration Target Configuration

vCenter Server and Update Manager run on the same vCenter Server appliance 8.0 with embedded vSphere
Windows machine Lifecycle Manager

vCenter Server and Update Manager run on different vCenter Server appliance 8.0 with embedded vSphere
Windows machines Lifecycle Manager

Update Manager run on a Windows machine and is vCenter Server appliance 8.0 with embedded vSphere
connected to a vCenter Server Appliance Lifecycle Manager

You can use the GUI method or the CLI method to migrate your vCenter Server deployment that
uses external Update Manager instance. If you use the GUI method, perform manual steps on
the Update Manager Windows system. If you use the CLI method, add configuration parameters
about Update Manager in your JSON template.

Important Verify that the Update Manager source machine does not run additional extensions
that are connected to other vCenter Server systems, which are not part of your migration.

Before the migration, Update Manager might use any of the supported Microsoft SQL Server,
Oracle, or embedded database solutions. After the migration to the vCenter Server appliance,
Update Manager is upgraded to embedded vSphere Lifecycle Manager, which uses the
PostgreSQL database.

System Requirements for Migrating vCenter Server

Deployments to vCenter Server Appliance Deployments
Your source and target systems must meet specific software and hardware requirements before
you can migrate a vCenter Server, vCenter Single Sign-On, or Platform Services Controller
deployment to a vCenter Server appliance.

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Source System
n Synchronize the clocks on all machines running the source vCenter Server services. See
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.

n Verify that your vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller certificates are valid for the
vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller and have not expired.

n Verify that the system network name of the machines running the target vCenter Server
services are valid, and are reachable from other machines in the network.

n Verify that the host name of the virtual machine or physical server from which you are
migrating vCenter Server complies with RFC 1123 guidelines.

n If your vCenter Server service is running in a user account other than the Local System
account, verify that the user account in which the vCenter Server service is running has the
following permissions:

n Member of the Administrators group

n Log on as a service

n Act as part of the operating system (if the user is a domain user)

n Replace a process level token

n Verify that the LOCAL SERVICE account has read permission on the folder in which vCenter
Server is installed and on the HKLM registry.

n Verify that the connection between the virtual machine or physical server and the domain
controller is working.

n Verify that the source vCenter Server instance or Platform Services Controller instance on
Windows does not use a DHCP IP address as its system network name.

Important Migration from a source Windows machine using a DHCP IP Address as its system
network name to an appliance is not supported.

Target System
n Your target system must meet specific software and hardware requirements for vCenter
Server appliance. See System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.

n When you use Fully Qualified Domain Names, make sure that the machine you use for
deploying the vCenter Server appliance and the target ESXi host or vCenter Server instance
are on the same DNS server.

n Synchronize the clocks of all target virtual machines on the vSphere network before
beginning migration. Unsynchronized clocks might result in authentication problems and
can cause the migration to fail or prevent the vCenter Server services from starting. See
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.

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Pre-migration Checks
When you migrate vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance, the upgrade
installer performs a pre-check of the environment to ensure it meets requirements. For example,
the pre-check verifies that enough space is available on the virtual machine or physical server
where you are migrating, and that the external database, if any, can be successfully accessed.

Source Environment Checks

When you migrate vCenter Server for Windows versions 6.7, vCenter Single Sign-On is included
as part of the Platform Services Controller. When you provide the information about the vCenter
Single Sign-On service, the installer uses the administrator account to check the host name and
password, to verify that the details of the vCenter Single Sign-On server you provided can be
authenticated before proceeding with the migration process.

The pre-migration checker performs checks for the following aspects of the source environment:

n vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller to verify that migration is supported

n SSL certificates validity and compatibility with system names

n Network connections

n DNS resolution

n Internal and external ports used

n External database connectivity

n Administrator privileges on the Windows machine

n Required disk space for exporting configuration data

n NTP server validation

n Any credentials that you enter

Target Environment Checks

The pre-migration checker performs checks for the following aspects of the target environment:

n Minimum processor requirements

n Minimum memory requirements

n Minimum disk space requirements

n Administrator privileges on the target host

n Any credentials that you enter

Known Limitations
The current release has several known limitations.

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The following list contains features or actions that are currently not supported:

n Local Windows OS users and groups are not migrated to the Photon OS of the vCenter
Server 8.0. If you assigned vCenter Server permissions to any Local Windows OS users and
groups, remove the permissions assignments before the migration. You can re-create Local
OS users and groups on the Photon OS of the vCenter Server 8.0 after the migration.

n After the migration, the source vCenter Server is turned off and cannot be turned on to
avoid network ID conflicts with the target vCenter Server appliance. After the source vCenter
Server is turned off, all solutions that are installed on the source vCenter Server and that are
not migrated become unavailable.

n Migration of deployments that use custom ports for services other than Auto Deploy, Update
Manager, vSphere ESXi Dump Collector, and HTTP reverse proxy (RHTTP) are not supported.

n The migration process migrates only one network adapter setting to the target vCenter
Server appliance. If the hostname of the source vCenter Server resolves to multiple IP
addresses across multiple network adapters, you can select which IP address and network
adapter settings to migrate. You cannot add the rest of the network adapters and settings to
the target vCenter Server appliance.

Preparing for Migration

Before beginning to migrate any type of vCenter Server deployment to an appliance, you must
complete the preparation tasks.

Preparation tasks:

n Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network

n Preparing vCenter Server Databases for Migration

n Prepare Managed ESXi Hosts for Migration

n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer

n Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine

Synchronize ESXi Clocks with a Network Time Server

Before you install vCenter Server, make sure all machines on your vSphere network have their
clocks synchronized.

This task explains how to set up NTP from the VMware Host Client.

Procedure

1 Start the VMware Host Client, and connect to the ESXi host.

2 Click Manage.

3 Under System, click Time & date, and click Edit settings.

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4 Select Use Network Time Protocol (enable NTP client).

5 In the NTP servers text box, enter the IP address or fully qualified domain name of one or
more NTP servers to synchronize with.

6 From the NTP Service Start-up Policy drop-down menu, select Start and stop with host.

7 Click Save.

The host synchronizes with the NTP server.

Preparing vCenter Server Databases for Migration

The vCenter Server appliance instance requires a database to store and organize server data.
Ensure your source vCenter Server database is prepared for migration to the target vCenter
Server appliance.

Each vCenter Server appliance instance must have its own database. The bundled PostgreSQL
database that is included in the vCenter Server appliance supports up to 2,500 hosts and 30,000
virtual machines.

To ensure your database is prepared for migration:

n Verify that passwords are current and not set to expire soon.

n (Optional) Reduce the database size. For more information, see Knowledge Base article KB
2110031.

n Verify that you have backed up your database. See your database documentation.

n Verify that vCenter Server can communicate with the local database.

During the migration of vCenter Server to vCenter Server appliance, the installer:

1 Exports the vCenter Server database.

2 Deploys the target vCenter Server appliance in an unconfigured state.

3 Copies exported data to the target vCenter Server appliance.

4 Starts the PostgreSQL service to import the source database data.

5 Upgrades the database schema to be compatible with the target vCenter Server appliance.

6 Starts the target vCenter Server appliance services.

When you configure the target vCenter Server appliance, you initialize and configure using the
imported database with the old schema. You have a choice of migration options:

1 Inventory tables

2 Inventory tables with events and tasks

3 All database data

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Prepare an Oracle Database for Migration

Ensure that you have the necessary credentials, and that you complete any necessary cleanup
or other preparation before migrating your Oracle database from Windows to an embedded
PostgreSQL database in the appliance.

Prerequisites

Verify that you have confirmed basic interoperability before preparing your Oracle database for
migration.

Verify that you have backed up your database. For information about backing up the vCenter
Server database, see the Oracle documentation.

Procedure

1 Verify that passwords are current and not set to expire soon.

2 Ensure that you have login credentials, the database name, and the database server name
that the vCenter Server database is to use.

Look in the ODBC system for the connection name of the database source name for the
vCenter Server database.

3 Use the Oracle SERVICE_NAME instead of SID to verify that your Oracle database instance is
available.

n Log in to the database server to read from the alert log: $ORACLE_BASE/diag/rdbms/
$instance_name/$INSTANCE_NAME/trace/alert_$ INSTANCE_NAME.log.

n Log in to the database server to read from the Oracle Listener status output.

n If you have the SQL*Plus client installed, you can use tnsping for the vCenter Database
instance. If the tnsping command does not work the first time, retry it after waiting a few
minutes. If retrying does not work, restart the vCenter Database instance on the Oracle
server and then retry tnsping to ensure it is available.

4 Verify that the JDBC driver file is included in the CLASSPATH variable.

5 Verify that permissions are set correctly.

6 Either assign the DBA role or grant the required permissions to the user.

7 Make a full backup of the vCenter Server database.

Results

Your database is prepared for the vCenter Server migration to vCenter Server Appliance.

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Prepare a Microsoft SQL Server Database for Migration

Ensure that you have the necessary credentials, and that you complete any necessary cleanup
or other preparation before migrating your Microsoft SQL Server database on Windows to an
embedded PostgreSQL database appliance.

Important You cannot use Integrate Windows for your authentication method if the vCenter
Server service is running under the Microsoft Windows built-in system account.

Prerequisites

Verify that you have backed up your database. For information about backing up the vCenter
Server database, see the Microsoft SQL Server documentation.

Procedure

1 Verify that passwords are current and not set to expire soon.

2 Verify that JDK 1.6 or later is installed on the vCenter Server machine.

3 Verify that the sqljdbc4.jar file is added to the CLASSPATH variable on the machine where
vCenter Server Appliance is to be migrated.

If the sqljdbc4.jar file is not installed on your system, the vCenter Server Appliance
installer installs it.

4 Verify that your system database source name is using the Microsoft SQL Server Native
Client 10 or 11 driver.

5 Make a full backup of the vCenter Server database.

Results

Your database is prepared for the vCenter Server migration to vCenter Server Appliance.

Prepare PostgreSQL Database Before Migrating vCenter Server to an Appliance

Ensure that you have the necessary credentials, and that you complete any necessary cleanup
or other preparation before migrating your PostgreSQL database installation on Windows to an
appliance.

For information about backing up the vCenter Server database, see the PostgreSQL
documentation.

Prerequisites

Verify that you have confirmed basic migration interoperability before preparing your
PostgreSQL database for migrating vCenter Server.

Procedure

1 Verify that passwords are current and not set to expire soon.

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2 For vCenter Server, locate the cleanup_orphaned_data_PostgresSQL.sql script in the ISO

image and copy it to your PostgreSQL server.

3 Log in to vCenter Server Appliance as root user.

4 Run the cleanup script.

/opt/vmware/vpostgres/9.4/bin/psql -U postgres -d VCDB -f path

cleanup_orphaned_data_Postgres.sql

The cleanup script cleans and purges any unnecessary or orphaned data in your vCenter
Server database that is not used by any vCenter Server component.

5 Make a full backup of the vCenter Server database.

Results

Your database is prepared for the vCenter Server migration to vCenter Server Appliance.

Prepare Managed ESXi Hosts for Migration

You must prepare the ESXi hosts managed by your vCenter Server installation before migrating it
from Windows to vCenter Server 8.0.

Prerequisites

To migrate vCenter Server or an external Platform Services Controller from Windows to vCenter
Server 8.0, your source and target ESXi hosts must meet the migration requirements.

n ESXi hosts must be at version 6.7 or greater. For information on ESXi compatibility, see the
VMware Compatibility Guide.

n ESXi hosts must not be in lockdown or maintenance mode.

Procedure

1 To keep your current SSL certificates, back up the SSL certificates that are on the vCenter
Server system before you upgrade to vCenter Server 8.0.

The default location of the SSL certificates is %allusersprofile%\VMware\VMware

VirtualCenter.

2 If you have Custom or Thumbprint certificates, see ESXi Host Upgrades and Certificates to
determine your preparatory steps.

3 If you have vSphere HA clusters, SSL certificate checking must be enabled.

If you have vSphere HA clusters, SSL certificate checking must be enabled.

a Select the vCenter Server instance in the vSphere Client inventory tree.

b Select the Manage tab and the General subtab.

c Verify that vCenter Server requires verified host SSL certificates is selected.

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Results

Your ESXi hosts are ready for migration to the vCenter Server appliance.

Preparing vCenter Server Certificates for Migration

You must verify that your source vCenter Server certificates are prepared before you start the
migration process.

In vSphere 6.0 and later certificates are stored in the VMware Endpoint Certificate Store. The
migration process proceeds normally and preserves your certificates. For information about
vCenter Server certificate locations, see Knowledge Base article KB 2111411.

Certificate Files Location

The vCenter Server certificate files are located at %ProgramData%\VMware\VMware
VirtualCenter\SSL

Supported Certificate Types

If your environment uses any of the supported certificate types, you can continue with the
migration. The migration process proceeds normally and preserves your certificates.

n Your rui.crt file contains the entire chain including the leaf certificate. You can create this
type of certificate by deploying and using the VMware SSL Certificate Automation Tool, see
see Knowledge Base article KB 2057340 .

n Your rui.crt file contains the leaf certificate and the corresponding cacert.pem is available
in %ProgramData%\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter\SSL to validate the rui.crt.

Unsupported Certificate Types

If your environment uses any of the unsupported certificate types, you must prepare your
certificates before you can proceed with the migration process proceeds.

n Your rui.crt contains only the leaf certificate, the cacert.pem is missing or invalid, and
cacert.pem is not added to the Windows trust store.

Get the Certificate Authority certificate, including all intermediate certificates, and create
a cacert.pem file, or replace the vCenter Server certificates with any of the supported
formats.

n Your rui.crt contains only the leaf certificate and the cacert.pem is missing or invalid, but
the cacert.pem is added to the Windows trust store.

Get the Certificate Authority certificate, including all intermediate certificates from the
Windows trust store and create cacert.pem. Use OpenSSL to verify the certificate by
running verify -CAfile cacert.pem rui.crt command.

For more information about vSphere security certificates, see the vSphere Security
documentation.

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System Requirements for the vCenter Server Installer

You can run the vCenter Server GUI or CLI installer from a network client machine that is running
on a Windows, Linux, or Mac operating system of a supported version.

To ensure optimal performance of the GUI and CLI installers, use a client machine that meets the
minimum hardware requirements.

Table 4-3. System Requirements for the GUI and CLI Installers

Operating System Supported Versions Minimum Hardware Configuration for Optimal Performance

Windows n Windows 10, 11 4 GB RAM, 2 CPU having 4 cores with 2.3 GHz, 32 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n Windows 2016 x64
bit
n Windows 2019 x64
bit
n Windows 2022 x64
bit

Linux n SUSE 15 4 GB RAM, 1 CPU having 2 cores with 2.3 GHz, 16 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n Ubuntu 18.04,
Note The CLI installer requires 64-bit OS.
20.04, 21.10

Mac n macOS 10.15, 11, 12 8 GB RAM, 1 CPU having 4 cores with 2.4 GHz, 150 GB hard disk, 1 NIC
n macOS Catalina, Big
Sur, Monterey

Note For client machines that run on Mac 10.15 or later, concurrent GUI deployments of multiple
appliances are unsupported. You must deploy the appliances in a sequence.

Note Visual C++ redistributable libraries need to be installed to run the CLI installer on versions
of Windows older than Windows 10. The Microsoft installers for these libraries are located in the
vcsa-cli-installer/win32/vcredist directory.

Note Deploying the vCenter Server appliance with the GUI requires a minimum resolution of
1024x768 to properly display. Lower resolutions can truncate the UI elements.

Determine the Oracle Database Size and the Storage Size for the
New Appliance
Before upgrading a vCenter Server appliance or migrating a vCenter Server on Windows that
uses an external Oracle database, you must determine the size of the existing database. Based
on the size of the existing database, you can calculate the minimum storage size for the new
vCenter Server appliance database using an embedded PostgreSQL database.

You run scripts to determine the Oracle core table size, the events and tasks table size, and the
statistics table size. The Oracle core table corresponds to the database (/storage/db) partition
of the PostgreSQL database. The Oracle events and tasks and statistics tables correspond to the
statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/seat) partition of the PostgreSQL database.

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During the upgrade of the appliance, you must select a storage size for the new appliance that is
at least twice the size of the Oracle tables size.

During the upgrade of the appliance, you can select the types of data to transfer to the new
appliance. To minimize upgrade time and storage requirements for the new appliance, you can
choose to transfer only the configuration data.

Prerequisites

You must have the vCenter Server database login credentials.

Procedure

1 Log in to a SQL*Plus session with the vCenter Server database user.

2 Determine the core table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM
(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,
'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'
FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE (ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'CL_%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VDC_%')
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_VM%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_DATASTORE%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%'
AND ti.tname NOT LIKE 'VPX_PROPERTY_BULLETIN%');

The script returns the database storage size in MB.

3 Determine the events and tasks table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM
(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,
'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'

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FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE
ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%');

The script returns the events and tasks storage size in MB.

4 Determine the statistics table size by running the following script.

SELECT ROUND(SUM(s.bytes)/(1024*1024)) SIZE_MB

FROM user_segments s
WHERE (s.segment_name,s.segment_type)
IN (SELECT seg_name, seg_type FROM
(SELECT t.table_name seg_name, t.table_name tname,
'TABLE' seg_type
FROM user_tables t
UNION
SELECT i.index_name, i.table_name,
'INDEX'
FROM user_indexes i
) ti
WHERE
ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%'
OR ti.tname LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%');

The script returns the statistics storage size in MB.

5 Calculate the minimum storage size for the new appliance that you are going to deploy
during the upgrade.

a The size of the database (/storage/db) partition of the embedded PostgreSQL database
must be at least twice the size of the Oracle core table returned in Step 2.

b The size of the statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/seat) partition of the
embedded PostgreSQL database must be at least twice the sum of the sizes of the Oracle
events and tasks and statistics tables returned in Step 3 and Step 4.
For example, if the Oracle core table is 100 MB, the events and tasks table is 1,000 MB, and
the statistics table is 2,000 MB, then the Postgres /storage/db partition must be at least
200 MB and the /storage/seat partition must be at least 6,000 MB.

Determine the Microsoft SQL Server Database Size and the Storage
Size for the New vCenter Server Appliance
Before upgrading a vCenter Server appliance, or migrating a vCenter Server on Windows that
uses an external Microsoft SQL Server database, you must determine the size of the existing
database. Based on the size of the existing database, you can calculate the minimum storage
size for the new vCenter Server appliance. This storage size allows the embedded PostgreSQL

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database to assume the data from the old database with enough free disk space after the
upgrade.

You run scripts to determine the Microsoft SQL Server core table size, the events and tasks
table size, and the statistics table size. The Microsoft SQL Server core table corresponds to the
database (/storage/db) partition of the PostgreSQL database. The Microsoft SQL Server events
and tasks and statistics tables correspond to the statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/
seat) partition of the PostgreSQL database.

During the upgrade of the appliance, you must select a storage size for the new appliance that is
at least twice the size of the Microsoft SQL Server tables size.

Prerequisites

You must have the vCenter Server database login credentials.

Procedure

1 Log in to a SQL Management Studio session with the vCenter Server database user.

2 Determine the core table size by running the following script.

SELECT SUM(p.used_page_count * 8)/1024 AS disk_size

FROM sys.dm_db_partition_stats p
JOIN sys.objects o
ON o.object_id = p.object_id
WHERE o.type_desc = 'USER_TABLE'
AND o.is_ms_shipped = 0 AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_VM%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_SDRS_STATS_DATASTORE%'
AND UPPER(o.name) NOT LIKE 'VPX_PROPERTY_BULLETIN%';

The script returns the database storage size in MB.

3 Determine the events and tasks table size by running the following script.

SELECT SUM(p.used_page_count * 8)/1024 AS disk_size

FROM sys.dm_db_partition_stats p
JOIN sys.objects o
ON o.object_id = p.object_id
WHERE o.type_desc = 'USER_TABLE'
AND o.is_ms_shipped = 0 AND ( UPPER(o.name) LIKE 'VPX_TASK%'
OR UPPER(o.name) LIKE 'VPX_EVENT%');

The script returns the events and tasks storage size in MB.

4 Determine the statistics table size by running the following script.

SELECT SUM(p.used_page_count * 8)/1024 AS disk_size

FROM sys.dm_db_partition_stats p

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JOIN sys.objects o
ON o.object_id = p.object_id
WHERE o.type_desc = 'USER_TABLE'
AND o.is_ms_shipped = 0
AND ( UPPER(o.name) LIKE 'VPX_HIST_STAT%'
OR UPPER(o.name) LIKE 'VPX_SAMPLE_TIME%'
OR UPPER(o.name) LIKE 'VPX_TOPN%');

The script returns the statistics storage size in MB.

5 Calculate the minimum storage size for the new appliance that you are going to deploy
during the upgrade.

a The size of the database (/storage/db) partition of the embedded PostgreSQL database
must be at least twice the size of the Microsoft SQL Server core table returned in Step 2.

b The size of the statistics, events, alarms, and tasks (/storage/seat) partition of the
embedded PostgreSQL database must be at least twice the sum of the sizes of the
Microsoft SQL Server events and tasks and statistics tables returned in Step 3 and Step 4.
For example, if the Microsoft SQL Server core table is 100 MB, the events and tasks table is
1,000 MB, and the statistics table is 2,000 MB, then the Postgres /storage/db partition must
be at least 200 MB and the /storage/seat partition must be at least 6,000 MB.

Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source

Windows Machine
You must download and run the VMware Migration Assistant on your source vCenter Server
or Platform Services Controller to prepare it for migration from Windows to a vCenter Server
appliance. If your deployment of vCenter Server has an external Update Manager that runs on
Windows, download and run the VMware Migration Assistant on the source Windows machine.
Update Manager prepares the Update Managerserver and database for migration from Windows
to the vCenter Server appliance.

The VMware Migration Assistant performs the following tasks on the source Windows machine
where you run it:

1 Discovers the source deployment type.

2 Runs pre-checks on the source.

3 Reports errors that must be addressed before starting the migration.

4 Provides information for the next steps in the migration process.

Ensure that the VMware Migration Assistant window remains open during the migration process.
Closing the VMware Migration Assistant causes the migration process to stop.

Prerequisites

n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

n Log in to the Windows machine as an administrator.

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Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server appliance installer package, locate the directory that contains VMware
Migration Assistant.

2 Copy the VMware Migration Assistant folder to the source Windows machine where either
one of the following components runs:

n Update Manager

n Platform Services Controller

n vCenter Server

Caution If Update Manager runs on a different Windows machine than any other of the
vCenter Server components that you are migrating, run VMware Migration Assistant on the
Update Manager source machine first. If you do not run VMware Migration Assistant on the
Update Manager source machine first, the VMware Migration Assistant on vCenter Server
may fail.

3 Run the VMware Migration Assistant on the Windows machine.

n For the GUI, double-click VMware-Migration-Assistant.exe

n For the CLI, enter: VMware-Migration-Assistant.exe -p <password of

Administrator@vmdir.domain>

To list all the available input parameters, enter: VMware-Migration-Assistant.exe --

help.

Important Leave the Migration Assistant window open until you finish the upgrade or the
migration process of your vCenter Server deployment.

The VMware Migration Assistant runs pre-upgrade checks and prompts you to resolve any
errors it finds before proceeding with the migration.

Results

When the pre-checks are finished and any errors are addressed, your source system is ready for
migration.

What to do next

To begin the migration process, follow the VMware Migration Assistant instructions.

For detailed migration steps, see one of the following.

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an Embedded Platform Services Controller to an

vCenter Server Appliance

n GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an External Platform Services Controller to an Appliance

n CLI Migration of a vCenter Server Installation from Windows to an Appliance

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Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server

To ensure the successful migration of vCenter Server, you must perform a set of required tasks
and pre-checks prior to running the migration.

General Prerequisites
n Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

n Verify that the clocks of all machines on the vSphere network are synchronized. See
Synchronizing Clocks on the vSphere Network.

Target System Prerequisites

n Verify that your system meets the minimum software and hardware requirements. See
System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is
not in lockdown or maintenance mode.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is
not part of a fully automated DRS cluster.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server
instance, verify that the cluster contains at least one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or
maintenance mode.

n If you plan to deploy the new appliance on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server
instance, verify that the cluster is not fully automated.

Source System Prerequisites

n Verify that the source machine that you want to migrate does not run on an ESXi host that is
part of a fully automated DRS cluster.

n Verify that you have sufficient disk space on the source machine that you want to migrate so
that you can accommodate the data for the migration.

n Create an image-based backup of the vCenter Server appliance you are migrating as a
precaution in case there is a failure during the migration process. If you are migrating a
vCenter Server appliance with an external Platform Services Controller, take a image-based
backup of the Platform Services Controller appliance as well.

Important To take a pre-migration image-based backup, power off all the vCenter Server
and Platform Services Controller nodes in your environment, and take a backup of each node.
After you have taken backups of all the nodes, you can restart them and proceed with the
migration procedure.

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If the migration fails, delete the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance, and restore the
vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller nodes from their respective backups. You
must restore all the nodes in the environment from their backups. Failing to do so will cause
the replication partners to be out of synchronization with the restored node.

To learn about image-based back, see "Image-Based Backup and Restore of a vCenter Server
Environment" in vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

n If you use an external database, back up the external database.

Network Prerequisites
n If you plan to assign a static IP address in the temporary network settings of the appliance,
verify that you have configured the forward and reverse DNS records for the IP address.

n If you plan to assign a DHCP IP address in the temporary network settings of the new
appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new appliance is in the
same network as the ESXi host on which the existing vCenter Server appliance runs.

n If you plan to assign a DHCP IP address in the temporary network settings of the new
appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new appliance is
connected to at least one network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC
address changes. Note that the default security policy of a distributed virtual switch is to
reject MAC address changes. For information about how to configure the security policy for a
switch or port group, see vSphere Networking.

n Add the source vCenter Server IP address in the DNS records.

Required Information for Migrating vCenter Server from

Windows to an Appliance
The vCenter Server migration wizard prompts you for the deployment and migration information
when migrating a vCenter Server instance or a Platform Services Controller instance from
Windows to an appliance. It is a best practice to keep a record of the values that you entered in
case you must power off the appliance and restore the source installation.

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You can use this worksheet to record the information that you need for migrating a vCenter
Server instance with a Platform Services Controller from Windows to an appliance.

Important The user name that you use to log in to the machine from which you want run the
GUI installer, the path to the vCenter Server Appliance installer, and your values including the
passwords, must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are
unsupported.

Local OS users existing on source windows machine are not migrated to the target vCenter
Server Appliance and must be recreated after migration is complete. If any local OS user
names are used to log in to the vCenter Single Sign-On, you must recreate them and reassign
permissions in the Platform Services Controller appliance.
If the source vCenter Server machine is joined to an Active Directory domain, the account you
use must have permissions to rejoin the machine to the domain. For more information, see http://
kb.vmware.com/kb/2146454.

Table 4-4. Information Required for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance

Required Information Default Value Your Entry

Required source vCenter Server IP address or FQDN

vCenter Server
migration data vCenter Single Sign-On administrator administrator@vsphere.loc
user name al

Important The user must

be
administrator@your_doma
in_name.

Password of the vCenter Single Sign-

On administrator

Migration Assistant port number

vCenter Server version

Temporary upgrade files path %LOCALAPPDATA%

\VMware\Migration-
Assistant\export

IP address or FQDN of the source

ESXi host on which the source
vCenter Server resides

Source ESXi host user name with

administrative rights on the source
ESXi host

Source ESXi host password

Migrate performance & other Deactivated by default

historical data

Migration Assistant thumbprint

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Table 4-4. Information Required for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance (continued)

Required Information Default Value Your Entry

Active Directory administrator

credentials

Service account credentials, if vCenter

Server is running under a customer
user account

Required target IP address or FQDN of the target ESXi

vCenter Server host or vCenter Server instance where
Appliance data you deploy the new vCenter Server
Appliance to which you migrate the
source vCenter Server

User name with administrative

privileges for the target ESXi host
or vCenter Server instance, data
center or data center folder, and
resource pool of an ESXi host or DRS
cluster to which to migrate the source
installation

Password for the target ESXi host. or

vCenter Server instance, data center
or data center folder, and resource
pool of an ESXi host or DRS cluster

vCenter Single Sign-On username

vCenter Single Sign-On password

Target vCenter Server Appliance

name

Password of the root user

vCenter Server Appliance size. Tiny (up to 10 hosts, 100

The options vary depending on the virtual machines)
size of your vSphere environment.
n Tiny (up to 10 hosts, 100 virtual
machines)
n Small (up to 100 hosts, 1,000
virtual machines)
n Medium (up to 400 hosts, 4,000
virtual machines)
n Large (up to 1,000 hosts, 10,000
virtual machines)
n X-Large (up to 2,000 hosts,
35,000 virtual machines)

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Table 4-4. Information Required for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance (continued)

Required Information Default Value Your Entry

Storage size of the vCenter Default

Server Appliance for your vSphere
environment.
Increase the default storage size if
you want larger volume for SEAT data
(stats, events, alarms, and tasks).
n Default

For tiny deployment size, deploys

the appliance with 250 GB of
storage.

For small deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 290
GB of storage.

For medium deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 425
GB of storage.

For large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 640
GB of storage.

For x-large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 980
GB of storage.
n Large

For tiny deployment size, deploys

the appliance with 775 GB of
storage.

For small deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 820
GB of storage.

For medium deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 925
GB of storage.

For large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 990
GB of storage.

For x-large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 1030
GB of storage.
n X-Large

For tiny deployment size, deploys

the appliance with 1650 GB of
storage.

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Table 4-4. Information Required for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to vCenter Server
Appliance (continued)

Required Information Default Value Your Entry

For small deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 1700
GB of storage.

For medium deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 1805
GB of storage.

For large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 1870
GB of storage.

For x-large deployment size,

deploys the appliance with 1910
GB of storage.

Name of the datastore on which the

new version of the vCenter Server
Appliance is deployed

Activate or deactivate thin disk mode. Deactivated by default

Join or do not participate in Join the CEIP

the VMware Customer Experience
Improvement Program (CEIP).
For information about the CEIP,
see the Configuring Customer
Experience Improvement Program
section in vCenter Server and Host
Management.

Temporary network IP address version IPv4

for communication
between the source IP address allocation method DHCP
vCenter Server and
the target vCenter
Server Appliance

Static assignment Network address

settings
Subnet mask

Network gateway

Network DNS servers, separated with

commas

Activate or deactivate SSH Deactivated by default

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GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an Embedded Platform

Services Controller to an vCenter Server Appliance
You can use the GUI method to migrate a vCenter Server instance with an embedded Platform
Services Controller to a vCenter Server appliance.

When you migrate from vCenter Server with an embedded Platform Services Controller on
Windows to vCenter Server appliance, the entire deployment is migrated in a single step.

If you use Update Manager in the vCenter Server deployment on Windows that you migrate, and
Update Manager runs on a separate machine from any other of the vCenter Server components,
take an extra step to migrate Update Manager to an appliance.

1 If your vCenter Server deployment on Windows uses an external Update Manager, run
Migration Assistant on the Update Manager machine to start the migration of the Update
Manager server and database to the Update Manager appliance.

2 Migrate the vCenter Server instance with embedded Platform Services Controller from
Windows to a vCenter Server appliance.

Figure 4-2. vCenter Server 6.7 with Embedded Platform Services Controller Deployment Before
and After Migration
vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server 8.0

vCenter Server

vCenter Server
Platform Services
Controller
Appliance

Windows OS

GUI tasks for migrating vCenter Server with an embedded Platform Services Controller from
Windows to a vCenter Server appliance.

1 Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer ISO file on a network virtual machine or
physical server from which you want to perform the migration.

2 Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine.

Note If you are migrating a vCenter Server system that uses an external instance of Update
Manager that runs on a separate Windows machine, first run Migration Assistant on the
Update Manager machine.

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3 Assemble the Required Information for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to an
Appliance.

4 Deploy the OVA File for Migrating to the Target vCenter Server Appliance.

5 Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance

Important The user name that you use to log in to the machine from which you want run the
GUI installer, the path to the vCenter Server appliance installer, and your values including the
passwords, must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are
unsupported.

The installer:

n Deploys a new target appliance.

n Exports the required files from the source vCenter Server.

n Copies the required files to the new vCenter Server appliance.

n Runs the migration process on the new vCenter Server appliance as specified in the
Summary.

n Imports and updates the files and settings of the source vCenter Server installation to the
new vCenter Server appliance.

Deploy the OVA File for Migrating to the Target vCenter Server
Appliance
To start the migration process, you use the GUI installer to deploy the OVA file that is included in
the installer ISO file as the target vCenter Server appliance.

Figure 4-3. vCenter Server 6.7 with Embedded Platform Services Controller Deployment Before
and After Migration
vCenter Server 6.7

vCenter Server 8.0

vCenter Server

vCenter Server
Platform Services
Controller
Appliance

Windows OS

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Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Migrate.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the migration process and click Next.

4 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

5 On the Connect to source page, enter the details for the source vCenter Server instance, and
click Next.

a Enter the IP address or FQDN.

b Enter the user name and password of a user who has administrative privileges on the
vCenter Server instance, for example, the administrator@your_domain_name user.

c Enter the Migration Assistant Port you received in the Migration Assistant instructions.

6 (Optional) Review the warning message and try to resolve the warnings, if any, and click Yes.

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7 Connect to the target server to which you want to migrate the source vCenter Server.

Option Steps

You can connect to 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
an ESXi host on which 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
to deploy the target 3 Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi
appliance. host, for example, the root user.
4 Click Next.
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.

You can connect to 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
a vCenter Server 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
instance and browse 3 Enter the user name and password of a vCenter Single Sign-On user with
the inventory to select administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the
an ESXi host or DRS administrator@your_domain_name user.
cluster on which to
4 Click Next.
deploy the target
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.
appliance.
6 Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS cluster
on which you want to deploy the new appliance, and click Next

Note You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least one
ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
7 Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance,
and click Next.

8 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the target vCenter Server
appliance, set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The password must contain at least eight characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase
letters, and a special character, for example, an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sigh
(@), or brackets (()).

Important The local operating system password is not migrated to the target appliance.

9 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Note You cannot select a deployment size that is smaller than the source deployment.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

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Deployment Size Option Description

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

Note At the bottom of the deployment size table, a row shows the size information of the
source machine. This size information is reported by the migration assistant and might help
understand why you cannot select some deployment sizes.

10 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

11 From the list of available datastores, select the location where all the virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks will be stored and, optionally, enable thin provisioning
by selecting Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

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12 Configure the temporary network for communication between the source vCenter Server and
the target vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed
virtual port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network type Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address and network settings.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment.

13 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the target
vCenter Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

14 Wait for the OVA deployment process to finish and click Continue to proceed with stage 2
of the migration process to transfer the data from the source vCenter Server and start the
services of the target appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface of the newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance to transfer
the data from the source vCenter Server and set up the services.

Results

The newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance version 8.0 is running on the target server
but is not yet configured.

Important The data from the source vCenter Server is not yet transferred and the services of
the target appliance are not started.

Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance

When the OVA deployment completes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the migration process to
transfer the data from the source vCenter Server and start the services of the newly deployed
vCenter Server appliance version 8.0.

Your window of downtime does not begin until you begin to set up the target appliance. You
cannot cancel or interrupt the process until it completes with the shut down of the source
deployment. Your window of downtime ends when the target appliance starts.

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Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the migration process and click Next.

2 On the Select source vCenter Server page, enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator
password and the root password of the source vCenter Server, enter the password of the
user with administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, and click Next.

3 (Optional) Accept the warning message, if any, by clicking Yes.

4 If your source Windows machine is connected to an Active Directory domain, enter the
credentials for an administrator domain user with permission to add the target machine to the
Active Directory domain, and click Next.

Note The installer verifies the entered credentials, but does not check the required
privileges to add the target machine to the Active Directory domain. Verify that the user
credentials have all the required permissions to add a machine to the Active Directory
domain.

5 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose if
you want to join the program.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

6 On the ready to complete page, review the migration settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

7 Click OK to confirm the shutdown of the source vCenter Server.

8 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish and click OK to go to the vCenter
Server Getting Started page.

Results

The source vCenter Server instance is migrated from Windows to a vCenter Server appliance.
The sourcevCenter Server instance is powered off and the new target appliance starts.

What to do next

Verify that your migration to an appliance was successful. For verification steps, see Verify Your
vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful. For post-migration steps, see Chapter 5 After
Upgrading or Migrating vCenter Server.

GUI Migration of vCenter Server with an External Platform

Services Controller to an Appliance
You can use the GUI to migrate vCenter Server with an external Platform Services Controller to a
vCenter Server appliance.

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Before migrating a vCenter Server deployment with an external Platform Services Controller, you
must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded Platform Services
Controller and then perform the migration. See Knowledge Base article KB 68137.

If you use Update Manager in the vCenter Server deployment on Windows that you migrate, and
Update Manager runs on a separate machine from any other of the vCenter Server components,
take an extra step to migrate Update Manager to an appliance.

1 If your vCenter Server deployment on Windows uses an external Update Manager, run
Migration Assistant on the Update Manager machine to start the migration of the Update
Manager server and database to the Update Manager appliance.

2 Migrate the vCenter Server instance from Windows to a vCenter Server appliance.

3 Verify the newly migrated vCenter Server appliance.

4 Decommision the Platform Services Controller.

Figure 4-4. vCenter Server 6.7 with External Platform Services Controller Before and After
Migration

vCenter Server 6.7

Platform Services vCenter Server 6.7

Controller
vCenter Server 8.0
vCenter Server
Windows OS Converge Migrate
vCenter Server
Platform Services
Controller

Appliance
vCenter Server
Windows OS

Windows OS

GUI tasks for migrating an external Platform Services Controller instance from Windows to an
appliance.

1 Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer ISO file on a network virtual machine or
physical server from which you want to perform the migration.

2 Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine.

Note If you are migrating a vCenter Server system that uses an external instance of Update
Manager that runs on a separate Windows machine, first run Migration Assistant on the
Update Manager machine.

3 Assemble the Required Information for Migrating vCenter Server from Windows to an
Appliance for each Platform Services Controller or vCenter Server instance.

4 Deploy the OVA File for the Target vCenter Server Appliance

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5 Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance

Important The user name you use to log in to the physical machine from which you want to
run the GUI installer, the path to the vCenter Server appliance installer, and values, including the
passwords, must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are
unsupported.

For each node to be migrated, the installer:

n Deploys a new target appliance.

n Exports the required files from the source Platform Services Controller or vCenter Server
instance.

n Copies the required files to the target appliance for migration.

n Runs the migration process on the target appliance as indicated in the Summary.

n Imports and updates the files and settings of the source Platform Services Controller or
vCenter Server instance to the new vCenter Server appliance.

Deploy the OVA File for the Target vCenter Server Appliance
To start the migration process, you use the GUI installer to deploy the OVA file that is included in
the installer ISO file as the target vCenter Server appliance.

Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the

subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.

n For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.

n For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.

n For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.

2 On the Home page, click Migrate.

3 Review the Introduction page to understand the migration process and click Next.

4 Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.

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5 Connect to the target server to which you want to migrate the source vCenter Server.

Option Steps

You can connect to 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
an ESXi host on which 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
to deploy the target 3 Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi
appliance. host, for example, the root user.
4 Click Next.
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.

You can connect to 1 Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
a vCenter Server 2 Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
instance and browse 3 Enter the user name and password of a vCenter Single Sign-On user with
the inventory to select administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the
an ESXi host or DRS administrator@your_domain_name user.
cluster on which to
4 Click Next.
deploy the target
5 Accept the certificate warning, if any, by clicking Yes.
appliance.
6 Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS cluster
on which you want to deploy the new appliance, and click Next

Note You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least one
ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
7 Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the new appliance,
and click Next.

6 (Optional) Review the warning message and try to resolve the warnings, if any, and click Yes.

7 On the Set up target appliance VM page, enter a name for the target vCenter Server
Appliance, set the password for the root user, and click Next.

The password must contain at least eight characters, a number, uppercase and lowercase
letters, and a special character, for example, an exclamation mark (!), hash key (#), at sigh
(@), or brackets (()).

Important The local operating system password is not migrated to the target appliance.

8 On the Connect to source page, enter the details for the source vCenter Server instance, and
click Next.

a Enter the IP address or FQDN.

b Enter the user name and password of a user who has administrative privileges on the
vCenter Server instance, for example, the administrator@your_domain_name user.

c Enter the Migration Assistant Port you received in the Migration Assistant instructions.

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9 On the Connect to source instance page, enter the details for the source Windows installation
that you want to migrate.

Option Action

vCenter Server IP Address/FQDN Enter the IP address or FQDN of the vCenter Server Appliance that you
want to upgrade.

vCenter Single Sign-On Enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name.
administrator user name

vCenter Single Sign-On Enter the password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator.
administrator password

vCenter Server HTTPS Port Optionally, change the default vCenter Server HTTPS port number.
The default value is 443.

10 (Optional) Accept the warning message, if any, by clicking Yes.

11 Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server Appliance for your vSphere inventory.

Deployment Size Option Description

Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

Note At the bottom of the deployment size table, a row shows the size information of the
source machine. This size information is reported by the migration assistant and might help
understand why you cannot select some deployment sizes.

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12 Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server Appliance, and click Next.

Storage Description for Description Description Description Description for X-

Size Tiny Deployment for Small for Medium for Large Large Deployment
Option Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Deployment Size Size

Default Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with 579 appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
GB of storage. 694 GB of 908 GB of 1358 GB of 2283 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage.

Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
2019 GB of 2044 GB of 2208 GB of 2258 GB of 2383 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

X-Large Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an Deploys an

appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with appliance with
4279 GB of 4304 GB of 4468 GB of 4518 GB of 4643 GB of
storage. storage. storage. storage. storage.

13 From the list of available datastores, select the location where all the virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks will be stored and, optionally, enable thin provisioning
by selecting Enable Thin Disk Mode. NFS datastores are thin provisioned by default.

14 Configure the temporary network for communication between the source vCenter Server and
the target vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.

Option Action

Choose a Select the network to which to connect the new appliance temporarily.
network The networks displayed in the drop-down menu depend on the network settings of the target
server. If you are deploying the appliance directly on an ESXi host, non-ephemeral distributed
virtual port groups are unsupported and are not displayed in the drop-down menu.

Important If you want to assign a temporary IPv4 address with DHCP allocation, you must select a
network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes.

IP Address Select the version for the temporary IP address of the new appliance.
family Can be either IPv4 or IPv6.

Network type Select the allocation method for the temporary IP address of the appliance.
n Static

The wizard prompts you to enter the temporary IP address and network settings.
n DHCP

A DHCP server is used to allocate the temporary IP address. Select this option only if a DHCP
server is available in your environment.

15 On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the target
vCenter Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.

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16 Wait for the OVA deployment to finish, and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of the
deployment process to set up and start the services of the newly deployed appliance.

Note If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server
Management Interface to set up and start the services.

Results

The newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance version 8.0 is running on the target server
but is not yet configured.

Important The data from the source vCenter Server is not yet transferred and the services of
the target appliance are not started.

Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance

When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the migration process to
transfer the data from the source vCenter Server and start the services of the newly deployed
target vCenter Server appliance.

The period of time during which your system is unavailable does not begin until you start to
set up the target appliance. You cannot cancel or interrupt the process until it finishes with the
shutdown of the source deployment. The time your system is unavailable ends when the target
appliance starts.

Procedure

1 Review the introduction to stage 2 of the migration process and click Next.

2 On the Select source vCenter Server page, enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator
password and the root password of the source vCenter Server, enter the password of the
user with administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, and click Next.

3 (Optional) Accept the warning message, if any, by clicking Yes.

4 If your source Windows machine is connected to an Active Directory domain, enter the
credentials for an administrator domain user with permission to add the target machine to the
Active Directory domain, and click Next.

Note The installer verifies the entered credentials, but does not check the required
privileges to add the target machine to the Active Directory domain. Verify that the user
credentials have all the required permissions to add a machine to the Active Directory
domain.

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5 Specify the replication topology for the vCenter Server. When converging vCenter Server
instance with an external Platform Services Controller you must specify the replication
topology.

Convergence is the process of converting a vCenter Server instance with an external Platform
Services Controller to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the
appliance.
n This is the first vCenter Server in the topology that I want to converge.

n This is a subsequent vCenter Server.

If this is a subsequent vCenter Server, provide the IP address of its partner vCenter Server
and its HTTPS port.

6 On the Select migration data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from
the source vCenter Server to the target appliance.

The large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance.

7 On the ready to complete page, review the migration settings, accept the backup
acknowledgment, and click Finish.

8 Click OK to confirm the shutdown of the source vCenter Server.

9 Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish. Click OK to go to the vCenter Server
Getting Started page.

Results

vCenter Server is migrated from Windows to a newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance.
The source vCenter Server is powered off and the target appliance starts.

What to do next

n Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.

n Upgrade all vCenter Server instances in the vCenter Single Sign-On domain.

n After converging a vCenter Server with an external Platform Services Controller node to a
vCenter Server appliance, you must decommission the original external Platform Services
Controller. Decommissioning a Platform Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from
the single sign-on domain. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

n For post-migration steps, see Chapter 5 After Upgrading or Migrating vCenter Server.

n You can configure high availability for the vCenter Server appliance. For information about
providing vCenter Server appliance high availability, see vSphere Availability.

CLI Migration of a vCenter Server Installation from Windows

to an Appliance
You can use the CLI installer to automatically migrate a vCenter Server or Platform Services
Controller from Windows to an appliance.

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The installer ISO file contains example templates of JSON files that contain the minimum
configuration parameters required for migrating a vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller
instance from Windows to an appliance. The example templates are located in the vcsa-cli-
installer/templates/migrate directory.

Note Before migrating a vCenter Server deployment with an external Platform Services
Controller, you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded
Platform Services Controller and then perform the migration. See Knowledge Base article KB
68137.

CLI tasks for migrating your vCenter Server installation from Windows to an appliance:

1 Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

2 Download and Run VMware Migration Assistant on the Source Windows Machine.

3 Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration.

4 Run a Pre-Check Before a CLI Migration to vCenter Server Appliance.

5 Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from Windows to an Appliance.

You can run the CLI installer multiple times with different JSON files to perform multiple CLI
migrations, or you can run the CLI migrations concurrently in a batch mode.

Important The user name that you use to log in to the machine from which you want to
run the CLI installer, the path to the vCenter Server appliance installer, the path to your JSON
configuration file, and the string values in your JSON configuration file, including the passwords,
must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration

When you use the CLI to migrate a source vCenter Server installation to a target vCenter
Server Appliance, you must prepare a JSON template with the configuration values for the new
appliance.

You can migrate vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller instances from Windows to a
vCenter Server Appliance by setting values to the configuration parameters in the templates that
are available in the installer ISO file. The configuration parameters that are not included in the
templates are set to their default values. You can add configuration parameters in the templates
to set their values for your migration specification.

The vcsa-cli-installer/templates/migrate directory contains example migration

templates for CLI migration of vCenter Server 6.7 to an appliance.

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For a complete list of the configuration parameters and their descriptions, navigate to
the installer subdirectory for your operating system and run the vcsa-deploy migrate --
template-help command.

Important The user name that you use to log in to the machine from which you want to
run the CLI installer, the path to the vCenter Server Appliance installer, the path to your JSON
configuration file, and the string values in your JSON configuration file, including the passwords,
must contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

To perform the batch migration, place the JSON templates defining your deployment in a single
directory. When invoked, the CLI installer migrates your existing deployment to the new vCenter
Server version using the topology defined in the JSON templates.

Prerequisites

Verify your environment meets the requirements for migration. See System Requirements for
Migrating vCenter Server Deployments to vCenter Server Appliance Deployments,

Prepare your environment for migration. See Preparing for Migration.

Procedure

1 Open the migrate subfolder in the vcsa-cli-installer/templates directory.

2 Copy the migration template from the migrate subfolder to your workspace. For vCenter
Server 6.7, use the migrate/winvc6.7/ folder.

3 Open the template file for your use case in a text editor.

To ensure the correct syntax of your JSON configuration file, use a JSON editor.

4 Fill in values for the required configuration parameters and, optionally, enter additional
parameters and their values.

Important To set a value that contains the backslash (\) or quotation mark (")
character, you must precede the character with the backslash (\) character. For example,
"password":"my\"password" sets the password my"password, "image":"C:\\vmware\\vcsa"
sets the path C:\vmware\vcsa.

The boolean values must contain only lowercase characters. Can be either true or false. For
example, "ssh_enable":false

5 Save in UTF-8 format and close the file.

Results

Your file is ready to use for migration.

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What to do next

You can create and save as many templates as are needed for your specific environment. When
your template is ready, run the pre-check before using it to run the migration. See Run a Pre-
Check Before a CLI Migration to vCenter Server Appliance.

JSON Templates for CLI Migration of vCenter Server for Windows

The vCenter Server installer contains JSON templates that are located in the vcsa-cli-
installer/templates directory. In the migrate subfolder, you can find the JSON templates
with the minimum configuration parameters for all migration types.

Table 4-5. Migration JSON Templates Included in the vCenter Server Installer

Location Template Description

vcsa-cli- embedded_win_vc_to_embedded_vC Contains the minimum configuration

installer\templates\migrate\vc SA_on_ESXi.json parameters required to migrate
sa\winvc6.7 vCenter Server 6.7 on Windows
with an embedded Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server
appliance 8.0 on an ESXi host.

embedded_win_vc_to_embedded_vC Contains the minimum configuration

SA_on_VC.json parameters required to migrate
vCenter Server 6.7 on Windows
with an embedded Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server
Appliance8.0 on a vCenter Server
instance.

win_vc_to_vCSA_on_ESXi.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters required to migrate
vCenter Server 6.7 on Windows
with an external Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server
appliance 8.0 on an ESXi host.

win_vc_to_vCSA_on_VC.json.json Contains the minimum configuration

parameters required to migrate
vCenter Server 6.7 on Windows
with an external Platform Services
Controller to vCenter Server
appliance 8.0 on a vCenter Server
instance.

About Migrating a vCenter Server for Windows with an External

Platform Services Controller Using the CLI
When migrating a vCenter Server for Windows that uses an external Platform Services Controller,
it is converted to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the appliance. For
this reason, you must specify replication partner parameters in the JSON migration templates.

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When migrating a vCenter Server for Windows that uses an external Platform Services
Controller, you must specify replication partner parameters in the JSON migrate template. These
parameters indicate if the migration is for one of the following vCenter Server and Platform
Services Controller migration scenarios.

n A single vCenter Server and a single Platform Services Controller instance within an SSO
domain.

n The first vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller instance within an SSO domain
containing more than one vCenter Server.

n Replicating vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller instances within an SSO domain,
which you must point to an existing vCenter Server 7.0 instance as the replication partner.

Important Before migrating a vCenter Server deployment using an external Platform Services
Controller, you must first converge the external Platform Services Controller to an embedded
Platform Services Controller and then perform the migration. For more information, see Removal
of Platform Services Controller.

Deployments using an external Platform Services Controller are often called an MxNdeployment,
where M represents the vCenter Server, and N represents the external Platform Services
Controller. When representing multiple instances of vCenter Server and Platform Services
Controller in a domain, this is expressed as MnxNn, where n is the number of instances. For
example, M2xN2 indicates two vCenter Server instances and two Platform Services Controller
instances within the same domain. When migrating such a deployment, you first migrate one
instance to version 8.0, and then migrate the second instance to 8.0, specifying the first of the
two instances as the replicating partner.

The replication parameters in the JSON migration template are located in the sso section of the
template, and are first_instance and replication_partner_hostname.

Parameter Name Description

first_instance The first_instance parameter identifies the vCenter

Server as either the first instance in your vCenter Server
SSO domain, or as a replicating partner.
If it is the first vCenter Server instance, set first_instance
to true For additional instances of vCenter Server in the
same SSO domain, set first_instance to false.

replication_partner_hostname* If you set first_instance to false, you must specify the

FQDN or IP address of a vCenter Server that has already
been migrated to version 8.0, and whose external PSC has
been converged into the vCenter Server appliance.

When you perform the CLI migration of a single vCenter Server for Windows instance that uses
an external Platform Services Controller, the process is as follows:

1 Migrate the vCenter Server in your topology using the win_vc_to_vCSA_on_ESXi.json

template when migrating on ESXi, or the win_vc_to_vCSA_on_VC.json template when
migrating on a vCenter Server deployment.

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2 For a deployment topology consisting of a single vCenter Server and a Platform Services
Controller (an M1xN1 deployment), edit the sso section of the template such that the
first_instance parameter is set to true, and remove the replication_partner_hostname
parameter.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the first instance (M1) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "true" and "replication_partner_hostname" removed.
],
"first_instance": true
}

3 Specify the remaining configuration parameters in the JSON template, and migrate vCenter
Server to version 8.0 using the CLI. See Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from
Windows to an Appliance.

4 After successfully migrating vCenter Server, decommission the Platform Services Controller.
See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

Important Decommission the Platform Services Controller instances only after migrating and
converging all vCenter Server instances in your topology.

For a deployment consisting of two or more vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller
instances (an M2xN2 deployment), you first migrate the M1 vCenter Server instance to version 8.0,
and then migrate the second, replicating vCenter Server instance.

1 Migrate the vCenter Server in your topology using the win_vc_to_vCSA_on_ESXi.json

template when migrating on ESXi, or the win_vc_to_vCSA_on_VC.json template when
migrating on a vCenter Server deployment.

2 For the first vCenter Server instance (M1), edit the sso section of the template such that
the first_instance parameter is set to true, and remove the replication_partner_hostname
parameter.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the first instance (M1) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "true" and "replication_partner_hostname" removed.
],
"first_instance": true
}

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3 For the remaining vCenter Server instance (M2), edit the sso section of the template such
that the first_instance parameter is set to false, and provide the FQDN or IP address of
the vCenter Server instance to which you want to replicate the second node. The replication
partner is the first vCenter Server instance (M1) you migrated to version 8.0, which has been
converged with its Platform Services Controller instance.

"sso": {
"__comments": [ This is the second instance (M2) vCenter Server management node, with
"first_instance" set to "false" and "replication_partner_hostname" set to the hostname of
the replication partner.],
"first_instance": false,
"replication_partner_hostname": "FQDN_or_IP_address"

4 Specify the remaining configuration parameters in the JSON templates, and migrate vCenter
Server to version 8.0 using the CLI. See Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from
Windows to an Appliance.

5 After successfully migrating all vCenter Server instances in the topology, decommission the
Platform Services Controller instances. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.

Important Decommission the Platform Services Controller instances only after migrating and
converging all vCenter Server instances in your topology.

Migration Configuration Parameters

When using the CLI installer to migrate your vCenter Server installation to an appliance, you must
provide the parameters with values for your migration specification.

The table lists the configuration parameters that you use to provide input data for the source
vCenter Server.

Important The path to the vCenter Server appliance installer, the path to your JSON
configuration file, and the string values in your JSON configuration file, including passwords, must
contain only ASCII characters. Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are not supported.

To set a value that contains the backslash (\) or quotation mark (") character, you must precede
the character with the backslash (\) character. For example, "password":"my\"password" sets the
password my"password, "image":"C:\\vmware\\vcsa" sets the path C:\vmware\vcsa.

The boolean values must contain only lowercase characters. Can be either true or false. For
example, "ssh_enable":false.

Sections and Subsections of Configuration Parameters in the JSON Migration

Templates
The configuration parameters in the JSON migration templates are organized in sections and
subsections.

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Table 4-6. Sections and Subsections of Configuration Parameters in the JSON Migration
Templates
Subsecti
Section on Description

new_vcsa - describes the esxi Use only if you want to deploy the appliance directly on an ESXi host.
target appliance that you Contains the configuration parameters that describe the target ESXi host.
want to migrate to
Note You must fill in either the esxi or the vc subsection.

vc Use only if you want to deploy the appliance on the inventory of a vCenter
Server instance.
Contains the configuration parameters that describe the target ESXi host or
DRS cluster from the vCenter Server inventory.

Note You must fill in either the vc or the esxi subsection.

applianc Contains the configuration parameters that describe the appliance.

e

os Contains the configuration parameters that describe the operating system

settings for the appliance.

ovftool_ Optional subsection for adding arbitrary arguments and their values to the
argument OVF Tool command that the installer generates.
s
Important The vCenter Server appliance installer does not validate the
configuration parameters in the ovftool_arguments subsection. If you set
arguments that the OVF Tool does not recognize, the deployment might fail.

temporar Contains the configuration parameters that describe the temporary network
y_networ for migrating the data from the source to the new target appliance.
k

user- Use only when the source is a vCenter Server instance. Contains the
options configuration parameters that let you control aspects of the migration process
for particular components.

source_vc - describes the vc_win Contains the configuration parameters that describe the source Windows
source vCenter Server, installation of vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller
vCenter Single Sign-On,
run_migr Use only if the source Windows installation is running as a virtual machine
or Platform Services
ation_as and you want to automate the invocation of Migration Assistant. For a
Controller
sistant source Windows installation running on a physical machine, or if you are
running Migration Assistant manually on the source Windows machine, copy
and paste the thumbprint value from the Migration Assistant console output
on the source machine to the migration_ssl_thumbprint key in the vc_win
subsection, and remove the run_migration_assistant section.

ceip - describes joining settings Contains only the ceip_enabled configuration parameter to join or not to join
the VMware Customer the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP).
Experience Improvement Required only if you are deploying a vCenter Server appliance.
Program (CEIP)
Note If set to true, you must run the CLI deployment command with the
--acknowledge-ceip argument.

For information about the CEIP, see the Configuring Customer Experience
Improvement Program section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

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Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section

Table 4-7. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, esxi Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the target ESXi host on which you want to deploy
the appliance.

username string A user name with administrative privileges on the target ESXi host, for
example, root.

password string The password of the user with administrative privileges on the target ESXi
host.

deployment_network string The name of the network to which to connect the appliance.

Note The network must be accessible from the target ESXi host.

Ignored if the target ESXi host has only one network.

datastore string The name of the datastore that you want to store all virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks of the appliance.

Note The datastore must be accessible from the ESXi host.

The datastore must have enough free space.

port integer The port number of the ESXi host. The default port is 443.

ssl_certificate_verifi string The CLI verifies that a server's security certificate is signed by a Certificate
cation Authority (CA), and establishes a secure connection. If the certificate is self-
signed, the CLI stops the upgrade unless you specify one of the following SSL
certificate configuration options.
Specify the Secure Hash Algorithm 1 (SHA-1) certificate thumbprint. A
certificate thumbprint is a hexadecimal string that uniquely identifies a
certificate. The thumbprint is calculated from the content of the certificate
using a thumbprint algorithm.

"thumbprint": "certificate SHA-1 thumbprint"

Set verification_mode to NONE.

"verification_mode": "NONE"

If you are connecting to a server with a self-signed certificate, and fail to

either specify the SHA-1 certificate thumbprint, or set the verification mode to
NONE, the CLI will display the server's self-signed certificate's thumbprint, and
prompt you to accept or reject the certificate thumbprint.
You can also specify that the CLI ignore the self-signed using the vcsa-
deploy upgrade command parameter --no-ssl-certificate-validation.
See Syntax of the CLI Migrate Command .

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Table 4-8. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The IP address or FQDN of the target vCenter Server instance on which you
want to deploy the appliance.

username string vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user name on the target vCenter Server
instance, for example, administrator@vsphere.local.

password string The password of the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator user on the target
vCenter Server instance.

deployment_network string The name of the network to which to connect the appliance.

Note The network must be accessible from the target ESXi host or DRS
cluster on which you want to deploy the appliance.

Ignored if the target ESXi host or DRS cluster has only one network.

datacenter string or The vCenter Server data center that contains the target ESXi host or DRS
array cluster on which you want to deploy the appliance.
If the datacenter is located in a folder or a structure of folders, the value must
be either a comma-separated list of strings or a comma-separated list as a
single string. For example,

["parent_folder", "child_folder", "datacenter_name"]

or

"parent_folder, child_folder, datacenter_name"

If there is no folder path on the data center, then use only the datacenter
name. For example,

["datacenter_name"]

or

"datacenter_name"

Note The value is case-sensitive.

datastore string The name of the datastore that you want to store all virtual machine
configuration files and virtual disks of the appliance.

Note The datastore must be accessible from the target ESXi host or DRS
cluster.

The datastore must have at least 25 GB of free space.

port integer The port number of the vCenter Server. The default port is 443.

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Table 4-8. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, vc Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

target string or The target cluster, ESXi host, or resource pool on which you want to deploy
array the new appliance. This is the target you specified with the datacenter
parameter. This path must end with a cluster name, ESXi hostname, or
resource pool name.

Important You must provide the name that is displayed in the vCenter Server
inventory. For example, if the name of the target ESXi host is an IP address in
the vCenter Server inventory, you cannot provide an FQDN.

Note All values are case-sensitive.

If you want the deployed appliance to be listed in a different location within

the data center's hierarchy, use the vm_folder parameter described later in
this section.
If the target cluster, ESXi host, or resource pool is located in a folder or a
structure of folders, the value must be a comma-separated list of strings or a
comma-separated list as a single string. For example,

["parent_folder", "child_folder", "esxi-host.domain.com"]

or

"parent_folder, child_folder, esxi-host.domain.com"

If the target ESXi host is part of a cluster, use a comma-separated list of

strings or a comma-separated list as a single string to provide the path. For
example,

["cluster_name", "esxi-host.domain.com"]

or

"cluster_name, esxi-host.domain.com"

If you are deploying to a resource pool, include the label Resources before
the resource pool name. For example:

["cluster_name", "Resources", "resource_pool_name"]

Note Pre-checks verify only the memory of the resource pool.

vm_folder string Optional. The name of the virtual machine (VM) folder to which to add the
appliance.

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Table 4-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, appliance Subsection

Name Type Description

thin_disk_mode Boolean Set to true to deploy the appliance with thin virtual disks.

deployment_option string The size of the appliance.

n Set to tiny if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to 10
hosts and 100 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 300 GB of

storage.
n Set to tiny-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for
up to 10 hosts and 100 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 825 GB of

storage.
n Set to tiny-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 10 hosts and 100 virtual machines with the x-large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 2 CPUs, 10 GB of memory, and 1700 GB of

storage.
n Set to small if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 340 GB of

storage.
n Set to small-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 870 GB of

storage.
n Set to small-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 100 hosts and 1,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 4 CPUs, 16 GB of memory, and 1750 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 525 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 1025 GB of

storage.
n Set to medium-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 400 hosts and 4,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 8 CPUs, 24 GB of memory, and 1905 GB of

storage.
n Set to large if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

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Table 4-9. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, appliance Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 740 GB of

storage.
n Set to large-lstorage if you want to deploy avCenter Server appliance for
up to 1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the large storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 1090 GB of

storage.
n Set to large-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 1,000 hosts and 10,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 16 CPUs, 32 GB of memory, and 1970 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance for up to
2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the default storage size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 1180 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge-lstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 1230 GB of

storage.
n Set to xlarge-xlstorage if you want to deploy a vCenter Server appliance
for up to 2,000 hosts and 35,000 virtual machines with the x-large storage
size.

Deploys an appliance with 24 CPUs, 48 GB of memory, and 2110 GB of

storage.

image string Optional. A local file path or URL to the vCenter Server appliance installation
package.
By default the installer uses the installation package that is included in the ISO
file, in the vcsa folder.

name string The VM name for the appliance.

Must contain only ASCII characters except a percent sign (%), backslash (\), or
forward slash (/) and must be no more than 80 characters in length.

ovftool_path string Optional. A local file path to the OVF Tool executable file.
By default the installer uses the OVF Tool instance that is included in the ISO
file, in the vcsa/ovftool folder.

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Table 4-10. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, os Subsection

Name Type Description

password string The password for the root user of the appliance operating system.
The password must contain between 8 and 20 characters, at least one
uppercase letter, at least one lowercase letter, at least one number, and at
least one special character, for example, a dollar sign ($), hash key (#), at
sign (@), period (.), or exclamation mark (!). All characters must be lower ASCII
characters without spaces.

ssh_enable Boolean Set to true to enable the SSH administrator login to the appliance.

Table 4-11. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, temporary_network Subsection

Name Type Description

ip_family string IP version for the network of the appliance.

Set to ipv4 or ipv6.

mode string IP assignment for the network of the appliance.

Set to static or dhcp.

ip string IP address for the appliance.

Required only if you use a static assignment, that is, if you set the mode
parameter to static.
You must set an IPv4 or IPv6 address that corresponds to the network IP
version, that is, to the value of the ip_family parameter.
An IPv4 address must comply with the RFC 790 guidelines.
An IPv6 address must comply with the RFC 2373 guidelines.

dns_servers string or IP addresses of one or more DNS servers.

array To set more than one DNS server, use a comma-separated list of strings or a
comma-separated list as a single string to provide the path. For example,

["x.y.z.a", "x.y.z.b"]

or

"x.y.z.a, x.y.z.b"

Required only if you use a static assignment, that is, if you set the mode
parameter to static.

prefix string Network prefix length.

Required only if you use assignment, that is, if you set the mode parameter to
static.

For IPv4 version, the value must be between 0 and 32.

For IPv6 version, the value must be between 0 and 128.

gateway string IP address of the default gateway.

For IPv6 version, the value can be default.

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Table 4-12. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, user_options Subsection

Name Type Description

vcdb_migrateSet string Select the types of data to migrate from the old appliance to the new
appliance. Data is copied from the source vCenter Server to the target server.
The original source of the data remains unchanged.
n Set to core if you want to transfer only the configuration data. This
provides the fastest data migration, keeping system downtime to a
minimum.
n Set to core_events_tasks if you want to transfer the configuration and
historical data (events and tasks) immediately. vCenter Server will not
start until all data has been migrated from the source vCenter Server for
Windows.
n Set to all if you want to transfer the configuration, historical, and
performance metrics data immediately. vCenter Server will not start until
all data has been migrated from the source vCenter Server for Windows.
This option transfers the largest amount of data, and requires more
downtime than other data migration options.
n Set to transfer_events_tasks_after_upgrade if you want to transfer the
historical data (events and tasks) in the background after the upgrade
finishes. During this time, vCenter Server performance might not be
optimal.
n Set to transfer_stats_events_tasks_after_upgrade if you want to
transfer historical data and performance metrics data in the background
after the upgrade finishes. During this time, vCenter Server performance
might not be optimal.

Note To minimize the migration time and the amount of storage required for
the new vCenter Server appliance, use the core value.

For more information on the types of data you can transfer from your existing
vCenter Server to the new, upgraded vCenter Server, see Transferring Data
from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

Table 4-13. Configuration Parameters in the new_vcsa Section, sso Subsection

Name Type Description

first_instance string Set first_instance to true if this is the first converge migration operation in
your vCenter Server SSO domain, or if you do not want to set the replication
partner for this node.
If you want to set the replication partner for this node, set first_instance
to false and provide the value of the replication_partner_hostname as the
FQDN of a previously converged node which is currently in an embedded
vCenter Server topology.
For more information on specifying the first_instance and
replication_partner_hostname parameters, see About Migrating a vCenter
Server for Windows with an External Platform Services Controller Using the
CLI.

replication_partner_ho string Host name of the replication partner. Remove if it is the first_instance
stname

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Requirements for the Automatic Invocation of Migration Assistant

You use the run_migration_assistant subsection to automate the invocation of Migration
Assistant. Automatic invocation works only if the source Windows installation is running as a
virtual machine.

The user account that you specify in the os_username or vum_os_username parameters needs a
privilege elevation to Administrator. For example:

n The built-in Windows Administrator account.

n A user account with a user name other than Administrator that is a member of the local
Windows Administrators group.

n The Domain Administrator account with the user name Administrator that is a member of the
local Windows Administrators group.

n The user name ID must be in the format your_domain_name\\user_ID or

user_ID@your_domain_name.

Restriction Automatic invocation of Migration Assistant does not work with a Windows account
that requires a privilege elevation to Administrator. Instead, run Migration Assistant manually
on the source Windows machine. Copy and paste the thumbprint value from the Migration
Assistant console output on the source machine to the migration_ssl_thumbprint key in the
vc_win subsection, and remove the run_migration_assistant section.

Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section

Table 4-14. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, vc_win Subsection

Name Type Description

hostname string The host name or IP address of the source Windows installation of vCenter
Server or Platform Services Controller that you want to migrate.

username string A vCenter Single Sign-On user name with administrative privileges for the
vCenter Server, vCenter Single Sign-On, or Platform Services Controller
instance that you want to migrate.

password string The password of the vCenter Server or Platform Services Controller instance
that you want to migrate.

migration_port string Migration Assistant port number shown in the Migration Assistant console. The
default port is 9123.

active_directory_domai string The name of the Active Directory domain to which the source vCenter Server
n instance is joined.

active_directory_usern string Administrator user name of the Active Directory domain to which the source
ame vCenter Server instance is joined.

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Table 4-14. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, vc_win Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

active_directory_passw string Administrator password of the Active Directory domain to which the source
ord vCenter Server instance is joined.

Note The installer verifies the entered credentials, but does not check the
required privileges to add the target machine to the Active Directory domain.
Verify that the user credentials have all the required permissions to add a
machine to the Active Directory domain.

migration_ssl_thumbpri string The SSL thumbprint of Migration Assistant.

nt

Table 4-15. Configuration Parameters in the source_vc Section, run_migration_assistant

Subsection

Name Type Description

esxi_hostname string FQDN or IP address of ESXi on which the source vCenter Server, vCenter
Single Sign-On, or Platform Services Controller instance resides.

esxi_username string User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host.

esxi_password string The password of the ESXi host user. If omitted, you are prompted to enter the
password at the command console during the template verification.

esxi_port string The port number of the ESXi host. The default port is 443.

os_username string Administrator user name for the source Windows machine.

os_password string Administrator user password for the source Windows machine. If omitted,
you are prompted to enter it at the command console during the template
verification.

migration_ip string The IP address of the network adapter to be migrated.

migration_port string Migration Assistant port number shown in the Migration Assistant console. The
default port is 9123.

export_dir string Directory to export source configuration and data.

sa_password string The IP address of the network vCenter Server service account user password.
This option is only required if the vCenter Server service is running under
a non-LocalSystem account. If omitted, you are prompted to enter it at the
command console during the template verification.

Table 4-16. Configuration Parameters in the source_vum Section, run_migration_assistant

Subsection

Name Type Description

esxi_hostname string FQDN or IP address of ESXi on which the source vCenter Server, vCenter
Single Sign-On, or Platform Services Controller instance resides.

esxi_username string User name of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host.

esxi_password string The password of the ESXi host user. If omitted, you are prompted to enter the
password at the command console during the template verification.

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Table 4-16. Configuration Parameters in the source_vum Section, run_migration_assistant

Subsection (continued)

Name Type Description

esxi_port string The port number of the ESXi host. The default port is 443.

vum_hostname string FQDN or IP address of ESXi on which the source Update Manager instance
resides.

vum_os_username string Administrator user name for the source Windows machine.

vum_os_password string Administrator user password for the source Update Manager Windows
machine. If omitted, you are prompted to enter it at the command console
during the template verification.

migration_port string Migration Assistant port number shown in the Migration Assistant console. The
default port is 9123.

export_dir string Directory to export source configuration and data.

Configuration Parameters in the ceip Section

Table 4-17. Configuration Parameters in the ceip Section, settings Subsection

Name Type Description

ceip_enabled Boolean Set to true to join the CEIP for this appliance.

Run a Pre-Check Before a CLI Migration to vCenter Server Appliance

You can run a pre-check to verify that the migration requirements are met and resolve any
problems before migration of your vCenter Server deployment.

Before migrating your vCenter Server deployment to an appliance, you can run a pre-check to
find out the disk space requirement, the estimated upgrade time, and the extensions registered
with the vCenter Server appliance. Running pre-upgrade is an optional but highly recommended
step when planning your upgrade.

Prerequisites

Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration using the example templates and Migration
Configuration Parameters.

Procedure

1 Verify your template without deploying the appliance by entering the command: vcsa-deploy
migrate --verify-template-only path_to_json_file.

2 Run CLI Migrate using the --precheck-only option.

You can adjust your migration plans using the disk space requirements and estimated
migration time. If you receive an error, you can troubleshoot and resolve the problem before
the actual migration.

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3 After resolving any errors, run the CLI Migrate command using the --verify-template-
only option again until all errors are resolved.

Results

You are now prepared for an error-free CLI migration process.

What to do next

Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from Windows to an Appliance.

Perform a CLI Migration of vCenter Server from Windows to an

Appliance
You can migrate vCenter Server to an appliance from a machine that is in your vSphere network.

Prerequisites

n See Prerequisites for Migrating vCenter Server

n Create a snapshot of the deployment that you want to migrate as a precaution in case of
failure during the migration process.

n Download the installer ISO file from the VMware website to a machine that is in your vSphere
network. The installer ISO filename is VMware-VCSA-all-8.0.0-yyyyyy.iso, where yyyyyy is
the build number. See Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.

n Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration.

n Run a Pre-Check Before a CLI Migration to vCenter Server Appliance to identify problems and
refine your migration plan.

n Review the optional arguments for running the migration. See Syntax of the CLI Migrate
Command.

Procedure

1 Navigate to the software CLI installer directory for your operating system.

n If you are deploying the appliance from a machine with Windows OS, navigate to the
vcsa-cli-installer\win32 directory.

n If you are deploying the appliance from a machine with Linux OS, navigate to the vcsa-
cli-installer/lin64 directory.

n If you are deploying the appliance from a machine with Mac OS, navigate to the vcsa-
cli-installer/mac directory.

2 Select the CLI installer: vcsa-deploy.exe.

3 Run the migration command.

vcsa-deploy migrate --accept-eula optional_arguments path_to_the_json_file

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The optional_arguments variable is a space-separated list of optional arguments to set

additional configurations.
For example, you can set the location of the log and other output files that the installer
generates.

vcsa-deploy migrate --accept-eula --log-dir=path_to_the_location path_to_the_json_file

Results

The migration template is deployed. You can Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is
Successful.

Syntax of the CLI Migrate Command

You can use one or more command arguments to set the execution parameters of the migrate
command.

You can add a space-separated list of arguments to the CLI upgrade command.

vcsa-deploy migrate list_of_arguments path_to_the_json_file

The required template argument provides the path of a JSON file that describes the vCenter
Server appliance deployment procedure. You can place multiple JASON files in a directory, and
the CLI will migrate all of the deployments in batch mode. For more information on performing
concurrent migrations, see Prepare JSON Configuration Files for CLI Migration.

Important The string values, including the passwords, must contain only ASCII characters.
Extended ASCII and non-ASCII characters are unsupported.

To set a value that contains the backslash (\) or quotation mark (") character, you must precede
the character with the backslash (\) character. For example, "password":"my\"password" sets the
password my"password, "image":"C:\\vmware\\vcsa" sets the path C:\vmware\vcsa.

The boolean values must contain only lowercase characters. Can be either true or false. For
example, "ssh.enable":false.

Optional Argument Description

--accept-eula Accepts the end-user license agreement.

Required for executing the deployment command.

-h, --help Displays the help message for the command.

--template-help Displays the help message for the configuration

parameters in the JSON deployment file. You can
use vcsa-deploy [subcommand] --help for a list of
subcommand-specific arguments.

-v, --verbose Adds debug information to the console output.

-t, --terse Hides the console output. Displays only warning and error
messages.

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Optional Argument Description

--log-dir, LOG_DIR Specifies the location of the log and other output files that
the installer generates.

--skip-ovftool-verification Performs basic verification of the configuration

parameters and deploys the vCenter Server appliance,
but does not validate the OVF Tool parameters in the
ovftool_arguments subsection of the JSON template. If
you set arguments that the OVF Tool does not recognize,
the deployment might fail.

--no-ssl-certificate-verification Prohibits SSL verification of ESXi connections.

The CLI verifies that a server's security certificate is
signed by a Certificate Authority (CA), and establishes
a secure connection. If the certificate is self-signed, the
CLI will stop the upgrade unless you specify that the
CLI ignore the self-signed certificate using the --no-ssl-
certificate-validation command parameter.

If you are connecting to a server with a self-signed

certificate, and fail to specify that the CLI accept it, the
CLI displays the server's self-signed certificate thumbprint,
and prompts you to accept or reject the it.
You can also specify that the CLI ignore self-signed
certificates using the ssl_certificate_verification
configuration parameter in the JSON template. See
Upgrade Configuration Parameters for CLI Upgrade of
vCenter Server Appliance .

Important Avoid using this option as it may cause

problems during or after upgrade due to an un-validated
identity of the target host.

--operation-id Lets you provide an identifier to track the concurrent

installation, migration, or upgrade of multiple vCenter
Server instances. If do not provide an operation ID, the
CLI generates a universally unique identifier (UUID) which
you can use to identify the different instances of vCenter
Server and their installation or upgrade status.

--verify-template-only Performs basic template verification without installing

Upgrade Runner, running prechecks, and upgrading or
migrating the vCenter Server appliance.

--precheck-only Installs Migration Assistant on the source vCenter Server

virtual machine, and runs a complete set of prechecks
without performing the migration.

--acknowledge-ceip Confirms acknowledgement of your VMware Customer

Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) participation.
This argument is required if ceip.enabled is set to true in
the upgrade template.

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Exit Code Description

0 Command ran successfully

1 Runtime error

2 Validation error

3 Template error

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After Upgrading or Migrating
vCenter Server 5
After you upgrade to vCenter Server, consider the post-upgrade options and requirements.

n Complete any component reconfigurations that might be required for changes during
upgrade.

n Verify that you understand the authentication process and identify your identity sources.

n If you migrated vCenter Server on Windows to a target vCenter Server appliance and you
use any local OS user names to log in to the vCenter Single Sign-On, you must recreate them
and reassign permissions.

n If you performed an upgrade, upgrade any additional modules that are linked to this instance
of vCenter Server, such as Update Manager. If you performed a migration from vCenter
Server for Windows to a vCenter Server appliance, the Update Manager module is migrated
as well into vSphere Lifecycle Manager.

n Optionally, upgrade or migrate the ESXi hosts in the vCenter Server inventory to the same
version as the vCenter Server instance.

n If you use Update Manager in your vCenter Server deployment, and Update Manager and
vCenter Server were running on separate machines prior the migration, consider to shut
down or delete the Update Manager host machine after the migration is complete. Before
disposing of the Update Manager host machine, take into account the following:

n You might need the host machine for rolling back purposes of your upgraded or migrated
environment.

n You might have other software that runs on that machine.

n If you are using smart card authentication, ensure to keep the smart card port open in
the client environment. By default, the smart card port is open in vCenter Server. For
details about the smart card port, see the VMware Ports and Protocols Tool™ at https://
ports.vmware.com

n If you plan to install Windows 11 as a guest operating system on a virtual machine, you
must configure a key provider. Installing Windows 11 requires a Trusted Platform Module
(TPM) 2.0. When installing Windows 11 as a guest operating system on a virtual machine,
instead of using a physical TPM, you can use a virtual Trusted Platform Module (vTPM).
A vTPM is a software-based representation of a physical TPM 2.0 chip. A vTPM depends
on virtual machine encryption to secure vital TPM data, and so requires that you configure

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a key provider. For information about the key providers supported by vSphere, see the
Virtual Machine Encryption chapter in the vSphere Security documentation. The easiest way
®
is to configure a VMware vSphere Native Key Provider™. vSphere Native Key Provider is
included in all vSphere editions and does not require an external key server. For information
about configuring a vSphere Native Key Provider, see Configuring and Managing vSphere
Native Key Provider chapter in the vSphere Security documentation. As with all security
solutions, consider the system design, implementation considerations, and tradeoffs of using
vSphere Native Key Provider.

n If you had modified the DRS cluster automation level before upgrade, you can either continue
to use the modified settings or revert the automation level to fully automated.

Read the following topics next:

n Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful

n How to Log in to Your vCenter Server by Using the vSphere Client

n Decommission the Platform Services Controller

n Identity Sources for vCenter Server with vCenter Single Sign-On

n Reregister Plug-In Solution in vCenter Server After Upgrade or Migration

n Roll Back a vCenter Server Upgrade or vCenter Server on Windows Migration

n Monitor and Manage Historical Data Migration

Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is

Successful
You can verify the success of your vCenter Server upgrade or migration.

You must be logged into the upgraded or migrated vCenter Server instance. If you created a
reference of required information based or a CLI template, you can use it to validate the upgrade
or migration success.

Procedure

1 Verify that the IP address is correct.

2 Verify that the Active Directory registration has not changed.

3 Verify the Network registration is correct.

4 Verify the Domain is correct.

5 Verify the certificates are valid.

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6 Verify the inventory data is correctly migrated.

a Review the events history.

b Review the performance charts.

c Review the users, permissions, and roles.

Results

If the postupgrade or postmigration configuration conforms to your required information or CLI

template reference and expectations, the vCenter Server upgrade or migration is complete.

What to do next

You can troubleshoot unexpected behavior by reviewing logs. You can also perform a rollback to
the source configuration. See Roll Back a vCenter Server Upgrade or vCenter Server on Windows
Migration

How to Log in to Your vCenter Server by Using the vSphere

Client
Learn how to use the vSphere Client to log in to vCenter Server and manage your vSphere
inventory.

Тhe vSphere Client is automatically installed as part of the vCenter Server appliance deployment.
This way, the vSphere Client always points to the same vCenter Single Sign-On instance.

Procedure

1 Open a Web browser and enter the URL for your vCenter Server instance: https://
vcenter_server_ip_address_or_fqdn

As an alternative, you can open a Web browser and enter the URL for the vSphere Client:
https://vcenter_server_ip_address_or_fqdn/ui.

2 If a warning message about a potential security risk appears, select to continue to the
website.

Browser Action

Microsoft Edge a Click Details.

b Under the additional message that appears, click Go on to the webpage.

Mozilla Firefox a Click Advanced.

b Under the additional message that appears, click Accept the Risk and
Continue.

Google Chrome a Click Advanced.

b Under the additional message that appears, click Proceed to
vcenter_server_ip_address_or_fqdn.

3 On the vSphere Welcome page, select Launch vSphere Client (HTML5).

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4 If the warning message about a potential security risk appears again, repeat Step 2.

5 Enter the credentials of a user who has permissions on vCenter Server and click Login.

Results

The vSphere Client connects to all the vCenter Server systems on which the specified user has
permissions, and you can view and manage the vSphere inventory.

Decommission the Platform Services Controller

After you upgrade to vCenter Server appliance, can decommission external Platform Services
Controller instances.

After converging an external Platform Services Controller node to a vCenter Server appliance,
decommission the original external Platform Services Controller. Decommissioning a Platform
Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single sign-on domain.

Prerequisites

Make sure no vCenter Server instances are pointing to the Platform Services Controller before
decommissioning.

Reconfigure any products deployed into the environment that use the Platform Services
Controller to use the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance.

Make a backup of the Platform Services Controller before decommissioning to ensure no loss of
data.

Decommission an External Platform Services Controller Appliance

Decommission and remove an external Platform Services Controller appliance from the vSphere
inventory.

After converging an external Platform Services Controller node to a vCenter Server appliance,
decommission the original external Platform Services Controller. Decommissioning a Platform
Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single sign-on domain.

Prerequisites

Make sure no vCenter Server instances are pointing to the Platform Services Controller before
decommissioning.

Reconfigure any products deployed into the environment that use the Platform Services
Controller to use the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance.

Make a backup of the Platform Services Controller before decommissioning to ensure no loss of
data.

Procedure

1 Stop the Platform Services Controller that you no longer need.

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2 Log in as root to the appliance shell of one of the Platform Services Controller appliances
within the domain.

3 Enable access to the Bash shell using the shell.set --enabled true command.

4 Start the Bash shell using the shell command, and log in.

5 Unregister the stopped Platform Services Controller appliance using the cmsso-util
unregister command.

Where, Platform_Services_Controller_System is the FQDN or IP address of the

Platform Services Controller that you want to decommission. Run this command only
on one of the Platform Services Controller replication partners, as the synchronization
removes the entries from all other Platform Services Controller replication partners. Enter
the vCenter_Single_Sign_On_password in quotes.

Note The cmsso-util unregister command restarts the services on the Platform Services
Controller on which you are running the command. It can take several minutes for the
command to finish.

cmsso-util unregister --node-pnid Platform_Services_Controller_System --username

administrator@your_domain_name --passwd 'vCenter_Single_Sign_On_password'

6 Remove the Platform Services Controller appliance that you no longer need from the vSphere
inventory.

What to do next

You can delete the virtual machine for the decommissioned Platform Services Controller.

Ensure that any external solutions or products are registered with the new vCenter Server
appliance.

Decommission an External Platform Server Controller for Windows

Decommission and remove an external Platform Services Controller for Windows from the
vSphere inventory.

After converging an external Platform Services Controller node to a vCenter Server appliance,
decommission the original external Platform Services Controller. Decommissioning a Platform
Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single sign-on domain.

Prerequisites

Make sure no vCenter Server instances are pointing to the Platform Services Controller before
decommissioning.

Reconfigure any products deployed into the environment that use the Platform Services
Controller to use the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance.

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Make a backup of the Platform Services Controller before decommissioning to ensure no loss of
data.

Procedure

1 On the Windows computer running Platform Services Controller, click Start > Run, type cmd,
and click OK.

The Command Prompt opens.

2 Navigate to the directory C:\Program Files\VMware\vCenter Server\bin\

3 Unregister the stopped Platform Services Controller appliance using the cmsso-util
unregister command.

Where, Platform_Services_Controller_System is the FQDN or IP address of the Platform

Services Controller that you want to decommission. Run this command only on one
of the Platform Services Controller replication partners, as the synchronization removes
the entries from all other Platform Services Controller replication partners. Enter the
vCenter_Single_Sign_On_password in quotes.

Note The cmsso-util unregister command restarts the services on the Platform Services
Controller on which you are running the command. It can take several minutes for the
command to finish.

cmsso-util unregister --node-pnid Platform_Services_Controller_System --username

administrator@your_domain_name --passwd 'vCenter_Single_Sign_On_password'

4 Remove the Platform Services Controller appliance that you no longer need from the vSphere
inventory.

What to do next

You can delete the virtual machine for the decommissioned Platform Services Controller.

Ensure that any external solutions or products are registered with the new vCenter Server
appliance.

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Identity Sources for vCenter Server with vCenter Single

Sign-On
You can use identity sources to attach one or more domains to vCenter Single Sign-On. A domain
is a repository for users and groups that the vCenter Single Sign-On server can use for user
authentication.

Note In vSphere 7.0 Update 2 and later, you can enable FIPS on vCenter Server. See the
vSphere Security documentation. AD over LDAP is not supported when FIPS is enabled. Use
external identity provider federation when in FIPS mode. See #unique_111.

Note In vSphere 7.0 Update 2 and later, you can enable FIPS on vCenter Server. See the
vSphere Security documentation. AD over LDAP is not supported when FIPS is enabled. Use
external identity provider federation when in FIPS mode. For more information about configuring
vCenter Server Identity Provider Federation, see vSphere Authentication documentation.

An administrator can add identity sources, set the default identity source, and create users and
groups in the vsphere.local identity source.

The user and group data is stored in Active Directory, OpenLDAP, or locally to the operating
system of the machine where vCenter Single Sign-On is installed. After installation, every instance
of vCenter Single Sign-On has the identity source your_domain_name, for example vsphere.local.
This identity source is internal to vCenter Single Sign-On.

Note At any time, only one default domain exists. If a user from a non-default domain logs in,
that user must add the domain name to authenticate successfully. The domain name is in the
form:

DOMAIN\user

The following identity sources are available.

n Active Directory over LDAP. vCenter Single Sign-On supports multiple Active Directory over
LDAP identity sources.

n Active Directory (Integrated Windows Authentication) versions 2003 and later. vCenter
Single Sign-On allows you to specify a single Active Directory domain as an identity source.
The domain can have child domains or be a forest root domain. The VMware knowledge
base article at https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/2064250 discusses Microsoft Active Directory
Trusts supported with vCenter Single Sign-On.

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n OpenLDAP versions 2.4 and later. vCenter Single Sign-On supports multiple OpenLDAP
identity sources.

Note A future update to Microsoft Windows will change the default behavior of Active
Directory to require strong authentication and encryption. This change will impact how
vCenter Server authenticates to Active Directory. If you use Active Directory as your identity
source for vCenter Server, you must plan to enable LDAPS. For more information about
this Microsoft security update, see https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/
advisory/ADV190023 and https://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2020/01/microsoft-ldap-vsphere-
channel-binding-signing-adv190023.html.

For more information about vCenter Single Sign-On, see vSphere Authentication.

Reregister Plug-In Solution in vCenter Server After Upgrade

or Migration
You reregister a previously registered plug-in solution and any third-party client plug-in packages
with vCenter Server after the SSL certificate has been refreshed following an upgrade or
migration.

Consult the vendor documentation for any solution-based vCenter Server extensions and client
plug-ins for instructions to re-register after a vCenter Server upgrade or migration.

If the procedure provided by your plug-in solution vendor fails to reregister the plug-in, you
can use the following procedure to remove the plug-in registration, and then register it again
with vCenter Server. For information on registering plug-ins, see the vCenter Server and Host
Management documentation. For information on removing or disabling unwanted plug-ins from
vCenter Server, see Knowledge Base article KB 102536.

Procedure

1 In a Web browser, navigate to the Managed Object Browser of your vCenter Server.

https://vcenter_server_ip_address_or_fqdn/mob/?moid=ExtensionManager

2 Log in with your vCenter Server credentials.

3 On the ManagedObjectReference:ExtensionManager page, under Methods, click

UnregisterExtension.

4 On the void UnregisterExtension page, in the text box inside the Value column, enter the
value for the key property of the Extension data object of your vSphere Client extension.

5 To unregister the extension click Invoke Method.

What to do next

Go to the solution registration page and register the plug-in.

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Verify that your extension is registered successfully with vCenter Server by using one of the
following approaches.

n In the vSphere Client, go to Administration and under Solutions, select Client Plug-Ins and
click Check for New Plug-Ins.

n Log out and log in again to the vSphere Client. The vSphere Client checks for new plug-ins for
each new user session

Roll Back a vCenter Server Upgrade or vCenter Server on

Windows Migration
You can roll back a vCenter Server upgrade or migration by reverting to the source appliance or
vCenter Server on Windows.

The rollback procedure applies in the following upgrade and migration contexts:

n vCenter Server appliance with an embedded Platform Services Controller .

n vCenter Server appliance with an external Platform Services Controller .

Prerequisites

You must have access to the source vCenter Server appliance or vCenter Server on Windows.

Procedure

u To revert a failed migration of vCenter Server, see Knowledge Base article KB 2146453.

Monitor and Manage Historical Data Migration

You can monitor and manage the background migration of historical data using the vCenter
Server Management Interface.

Using the vCenter Server Appliance Management Interface, you can perform the following data
management tasks:

n Monitor the progress of the data migration.

n Pause the data migration.

n Cancel the data migration.

Prerequisites

n Verify that vCenter Server is successfully deployed and running.

n You must have selected to import historical data from the external database in use by the
previous version of vCenter Server, to the embedded PostgreSQL database in vCenter Server
8.0. See Transferring Data from an Existing vCenter Server Appliance.

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Procedure

1 In a Web browser, go to the vCenter Server Management Interface, https://appliance-IP-

address-or-FQDN:5480.
2 Log in as root.

The default root password is the password you set when deploying vCenter Server .

3 A status bar at the top of the vCenter Server Management Interface displays the percentage
of data that has been copied from the source vCenter Server to the PostgreSQL database
embedded in the target vCenter Server appliance.

4 To pause or cancel the data migration, click Manage.

Option Description

Pause During the data migration, vCenter Server performance might not be
optimal. Pausing the migration lets vCenter Server run with better
performance until such time that you can resume the process when it does
not interfere with the needs of your business.

Resume You can resume the data migration at a time that does not interfere with the
business needs of your vCenter Server deployment.

Cancel If you cancel the data import, the historical data will fail to import to the
embedded PostgreSQL database. You cannot recover the data once you
cancel the operation.
If you cancel the import process, and want to import the historical data later,
you must restart the upgrade or migration process from Stage 1 of the GUI
installer.

Results

When the data has been migrated, a success message displays in the vCenter Server
Management Interface status bar.

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Managing Software Updates,
Upgrades, and Product
Compatibility
6
You can view available vCenter Server updates and upgrades and produce interoperability
reports about VMware products associated with vCenter Server. The reports help you plan
vCenter Server updates and upgrades in your environment.

You can perform an interoperability check of VMware products within your environment againist
both source and target vCenter Server versions. You can also generate a pre-update report
to ensure your environment meets the minimum software and hardware requirements for a
successful upgrade of vCenter Server. You can plan vCenter Server updates and upgrades based
on the information in the reports you generate.

Interoperability report for the current vCenter Server

Lists VMware products in your environment and their compatibility with the current, or
source, version of vCenter Server.

Interoperability reports for target versions of vCenter Server

Lists the VMware products in your environment and their compatibility againist the target
version of vCenter Server to which you want to upgrade.

Pre-update reports

With the pre-update report, you can ensure that your system meets the minimum software
and hardware requirements for a successful upgrade of vCenter Server. The report provides
information about problems that might prevent the completion of a software upgrade, and
actions you can take to remedy those problems.

Read the following topics next:

n Monitor Interoperability for the Current vCenter Server Version

n Generate an Interoperability Report for Target vCenter Server Versions

n Generate Pre-Update Reports

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Monitor Interoperability for the Current vCenter Server

Version
You can view an interoperability report that lists products in your environment associated with
the current vCenter Server version and their compatibility.

The product interoperability report lists available products in your environment and their
compatibility with the selected vCenter Server version.

Prerequisites

To use Update Planner, you must join the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program
(CEIP). For information about the CEIP, see the "Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program" section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client navigate to a vCenter Server for which you want to view an
interoperability report.

2 On the Monitor tab, click Interoperability.

The Product Interoperability report lists all available products in your environment associated
with the selected vCenter Server.

3 (Optional) If there are VMware products in your environment that go undetected, you can
manually add them to the list of products to check and regenerate the interoperability report.

a Click Add Product in the Product Interoperability pane.

b Select the VMware product and version you want to include in the interoperability report.

Repeat this step for each VMware product you want to add to the report.

c To add the selected products to the product inventory click Done.

d Regenerate the report and verify that the products you added are included in the report.

4 (Optional) Click Export in the Product Interoperability pane to export and save a copy of the
report as a comma-separated values (CSV) file, which allows data to be saved in a tabular
format.

What to do next

n Using the information in the report, you can apply patches and updates to your vCenter
Server environment. See Chapter 7 Patching and Updating vCenter Server 8.0 Deployments.

n You can generate a pre-upgrade report that lists actions that you must address to ensure a
successful upgrade of vCenter Server in your environment. See Generate an Interoperability
Report for Target vCenter Server Versions.

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Generate an Interoperability Report for Target vCenter

Server Versions
You can perform pre-checks and generate reports that provide product interoperability
information for recommended update and upgrade versions of vCenter Server.

You can create a vCenter Server pre-update interoperability report to check the compatibility
of VMware products in your environment againist a pending version of vCenter Server. You can
view the list of products in your environment that are associated with the current vCenter Server
version, and wheather or not those products are compatible with a suggested update version.

Prerequisites

To use this feature, you must join the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program
(CEIP). For information about the CEIP, see the "Configuring Customer Experience Improvement
Program" section in vCenter Server and Host Management.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client, select a vCenter Server for which you want to view an interoperability
report.

2 On the Updates tab, click Update

3 Click Target Version.

4 Select the target version from the list of available updates and click OK. The list contains
minor updates and major upgrade versions of vCenter Server.

5 Click Product Interoperability to view the report.

6 (Optional) If there are VMware products in your environment that go undetected, you can
manually add them to the list of products to check and regenerate the interoperability report.

a Click Modify Product List.

b Select the VMware product and version you want to include in the interoperability report.

Repeat this step for each VMware product you want to add to the report.

c To add the selected products to the Update product inventory click Done.

d Regenerate the report and verify that the products you added are included in the report.

7 (Optional) Click Export to save the report as a comma-separated values (CSV) file, which
allows data to be saved in a tabular format.

What to do next

n Using the information in the pre-upgrade report, you can apply patches and updates to
your vCenter Server environment. See Chapter 7 Patching and Updating vCenter Server 8.0
Deployments.

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n You can generate a pre-upgrade report that lists actions that you must address to ensure a
successful upgrade of vCenter Server in your environment. See Generate an Interoperability
Report for Target vCenter Server Versions.

Generate Pre-Update Reports

You can run pre-checks and generate reports that provide pre-update information. You use
this information to make sure that your system meets the minimum software and hardware
requirements to ensure a successful upgrade of vCenter Server.

When you generate a pre-update report, the report lists the actions you must address to
ensure a successful upgrade of vCenter Server in your environment. The report also provides
information about problems that might prevent the completion of a software upgrade or update.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client, select a vCenter Server for which you want to view a pre-update
report.

2 On the Updates tab, click Update.

3 Click Target Version.

4 Select the target version from the list of available updates and click OK. The list contains
minor updates and major upgrade versions of vCenter Server.

5 Select Source Pre-Checks to view pre-update report.

6 (Optional) Click Export to save the report as a comma-separated values (CSV) file, which
allows data to be saved in a tabular format.

What to do next

n Using the information in the pre-upgrade report, you can apply patches and updates to
your vCenter Server environment. See Chapter 7 Patching and Updating vCenter Server 8.0
Deployments.

n You can generate an interoperability report that lists available VMware products in your
environment, and the versions compatible with the vCenter Server version for which you are
generating the report. See Generate an Interoperability Report for Target vCenter Server
Versions.

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Server 8.0 Deployments 7
You can update the vCenter Server with patches by using the software-packages utility
available in the vCenter Server appliance shell.

Read the following topics next:

n Patching vCenter Server

Patching vCenter Server

VMware regularly releases patches for the vCenter Server. You can use the Appliance
Management Interface or the appliance shell to apply patches to a vCenter Server.

VMware makes patches available on a monthly basis. These patches can only be applied in
between major releases of vCenter Server. For example, patches released for the initial release of
vCenter Server 8.0, are not applicable to vCenter Server 8.0 Update 1, as any patches previously
made available will be included with the Update 1 release.

These patches can be for core product functionality, other packages in the vCenter Server such
as Photon, or both.

Note You must use only the patches provided by VMware to update the packages in your
vCenter Server. Updating these packages through any other means may impact the product
functionality.

VMware distributes the available patches in two forms, one for ISO-based and one for URL-based
models of patching.

n You can download the patch ISO images from https://my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch.

VMware publishes a single type of ISO image that contains patches.

Download Filename Description

VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance- Full product patch for the appliance, which contains

product_version-build_number-patch-FP.iso the VMware software patches and the fixes related to
security and third-party products (e.g. JRE and Photon
OS components).

n You can configure the vCenter Server appliance to use a repository URL as a source of
available patches. The appliance is preset with a default VMware repository URL.

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You can download the patches in ZIP format from the VMware Web site at https://
my.vmware.com/web/vmware/downloads and build a custom repository on a local Web
server. The download filename is VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-product_version-
build_number-updaterepo.zip.

Patching vCenter Server Using the vCenter Server Management

Interface
You can use the vCenter Server Management Interface to view the installed patches, check for
new patches and install them, and configure automatic checks for available patches.

To perform ISO-based patching, you download an ISO image, attach the ISO image to the
CD/DVD drive of the appliance, check for available patches in the ISO image, and install the
patches.

To perform URL-based patching, you check for available patches in a repository URL and install
the patches. The vCenter Server is preset with a default VMware repository URL for the build
profile of the appliance. You can configure the appliance to use the default VMware repository
URL or a custom repository URL, for example, a repository URL that you previously built on a
local Web server running within your data center.

Automatic Creation of LVM Snapshot

The vCenter Server patching orchestrator automatically creates a Logical Volume Manager (LVM)
snapshot of the vCenter Server before performing a patch installation. If the patching fails,
the orchestrator provides options to either continue patching or roll back to the automatically
created LVM snapshot.

The roll back option is only available when you are patching vCenter Server 8.0 Update 2 and
higher versions.

When you initiate the installation of a patch, prechecks are performed to verify that a snapshot
can be taken and there is sufficient disk space for the LVM snapshot. If the precheck returns an
error, the patching workflow exits.

After prechecks run successfully, the VMware Directory Services (vmdird) is stopped and the
orchestrator takes an image-based backup (LVM snapshot). The snapshot is saved as snapshot
disk on the vCenter Server Appliance. If there is a failure while taking the snapshot, the vmdird
is started in normal replication mode, an error is thrown and the patching workflow exits and the
snapshot is cleaned up.

If the snapshot is taken successfully, the patching resumes with vmdird in standalone mode.

If an error occurs during patching, the vCenter Server Management Interface displays options
to resume or rollback the process. You can select Resume the vCenter installation and correct
the problem preventing the patching to finish staging the patches or select Revert to the last
vCenter backup version to roll back.

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If you choose to revert, a patching rollback API is called. The API checks if an LVM snapshot is
available and reverts to the snapshot. After reverting, the snapshot is removed to reclaim the
disk space and vmdird is set to normal replication mode. The API also performs a cleanup of any
changes made by the patching install workflow before creating the backup. If a valid snapshot is
not available, the installation exits with an error.

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Figure 7-1. Workflow for automatic creation of LVM snapshot and roll back

Install patches

Set vmdird to Maintenance mode

Take LVM snapshot

Continue patching with

Fix errors
vmdird in Maintenance mode

Resume

Patching No Resume or
successful roll back?

Yes Roll back

Remove LVM snapshot

Is valid No Rollback fails and
LVM snapshot process exits
available?
Set vmdird to Normal mode

Yes

Patching complete
Revert to LVM snapshot

vCenter restarts

Remove LVM snapshot

Set vmdird to Normal mode

End

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Log In to the vCenter Server Management Interface

Log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface to access the vCenter Server configuration
settings.

Note The login session expires if you leave the vCenter Server Management Interface idle for 10
minutes.

Prerequisites

Verify that the vCenter Server is successfully deployed and running.

Procedure

1 In a Web browser, go to the vCenter Server Management Interface, https://appliance-IP-

address-or-FQDN:5480.
2 Log in as root.

The default root password is the password that you set while deploying vCenter Server.

Check for and Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance

Before you install available patches, you can stage the patches to the appliance. You can
use the vCenter Server Management Interface to stage patches either from a local repository
by attaching an ISO image to the appliance, or from a remote repository directly by using a
repository URL.

During the process of staging, the vCenter Server Management Interface validates that a patch
is a VMware patch, that the staging area has enough free space, and that the patches are not
altered. Only new patches or patches for existing packages that can be upgraded are staged.

If you are patching vCenter Server 8.0 Update 2 and higher versions, the patching orchestrator
automatically creates a backup of the vCenter Server before performing a patch installation. For
more information, see Automatic Creation of LVM Snapshot.

If a problem that prevents the successful staging of the patches occurs, vCenter Server suspends
the staging process. Review the error messages, correct the problem, and, in many cases,
you can resume staging the patches from the point at which vCenter Server encountered the
problem.

Prerequisites

n If you are staging patches from an ISO image that you previously downloaded from https://
my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch, you must attach the ISO image to the CD/DVD drive
of the vCenter Server. You can configure the ISO image as a datastore ISO file for the
CD/DVD drive of the appliance using the vSphere Client. See vSphere Virtual Machine
Administration.
n If you are staging patches from a remote repository, verify that you have configured the
repository settings and that the current repository URL is accessible. See Configure URL-
Based Patching.

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Procedure

1 Log into the vCenter Server Management Interface as root.

The default root password is the password you set when deploying vCenter Server.

2 Click Update.

3 Click Check Updates and select a source.

Option Description

Check URL Scans the configured repository URL for available patches.

Check CDROM Scans the ISO image that you attached to the CD/DVD drive of the
appliance for available patches.

In the Available Updates pane, you can view the details about the available patches in the
source that you selected.

Important Some updates might require a reboot of the system. You can see information
about these updates in the Available Updates pane.

4 You can run a pre-check of an update to verify that it is compatible with your current
deployment.

5 Click the staging option you would like to use.

Option Description

Stage Stages the selected patches to the vCenter Server appliance for installation
at a later time.

Stage and Install Stages and installs the selected patches to the vCenter Server appliance. For
more information on installing patches, see Install vCenter Server Patches.

Unstage Unstages the selected patches.

Resume the vCenter installation If vCenter Server encounters a problem staging the patches, the vCenter
Server Management Interface displays the Resume button. Correct the
problem preventing the patches from staging, and click Resume to finish
staging the patches. The staging process resumes from the point at which
vCenter Server encountered the problem.

Revert to last vCenter backup option Select this option to roll back to the automatically created snapshot. If you
choose to revert, a patching rollback API is called. The API checks if a
snapshot is available and reverts to the snapshot.

Note The automatic creation of a backup is available only when you are
patching vCenter Server 8.0 Update 2 and higher versions.

What to do next

If you decided to stage the available patches for installation at a later time, you can now install.
See Install vCenter Server Patches.

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Configure the Repository for URL-Based Patching

For URL-based patching, by default the vCenter Server appliance is configured to use the default
VMware repository URL that is preset for the build profile of the appliance. You can configure a
custom repository URL as the current source of patches for your environment's requirements.

By default the current repository for URL-based patching is the default VMware repository URL.

If vCenter Server is not connected to the Internet or if your security policy requires it, you can
build and configure a custom repository. The custom patching repository runs on a local Web
server within your data center and replicates the data from the default repository. Optionally,
you can set up an authentication policy for accessing the Web server that hosts the custom
patching repository.

Prerequisites

Log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface as root.

Procedure

1 If you want to configure a custom repository URL, build the repository on your local web
server.

a Log in to VMware Customer Connect at https://customerconnect.vmware.com/

downloads/#all_products.

b Select Download Product under VMware vSphere.

c Select the vCenter Server version from the Select Version drop-down.

d Against your license type, click GO TO DOWNLOADS in the row for VMware vCenter
Server.

e Download the VMware vCenter Server Appliance Update Bundle ZIP file.

f Confirm that the md5sum is correct by using an MD5 checksum tool.

g On your Web server, create a repository directory under the root.

For example, create the vc_update_repo directory.

h Extract the ZIP file into the repository directory.

The extracted files are in the manifest and package-pool subdirectories.

2 In the vCenter Server Management Interface, click Update.

3 Click Settings.

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4 Select the Repository settings.

Option Description

Default repository Uses the default VMware repository URL that is preset for the build profile
of the appliance.

Specified repository Uses a custom repository. You must enter the repository URL, for example,
https://web_server_name.your_company.com/vc_update_repo.
The repository URL must use a secure protocol such as HTTPS or FTPS.

5 If the specified repository requires authentication, enter the user name and password.

6 (Optional) If you do not want to perform a security certificate check, deselect the Check
Certificate check box.

If you trust the URL for the repository, you can choose to bypass the certificate check for the
repository URL.

7 Click OK.

What to do next

Install vCenter Server Patches

Install vCenter Server Patches

You can check for and install patches either from an ISO image or directly from a repository URL.

Important The services running in the vCenter Server appliance become unavailable during the
installation of the patches. You must perform this procedure during a maintenance period. As a
precaution if there is a failure, you can back up the vCenter Server. For information on backing up
and restoring vCenter Server, see vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

Prerequisites

n Log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface as root.

n Before you can install available patches, you check for new patches and stage the patches
to the vCenter Server appliance. See Check for and Stage Patches to the vCenter Server
Appliance.

n If you are patching the appliance from an ISO image that you previously downloaded
from https://my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch, you must attach the ISO image to the
CD/DVD drive of the vCenter Server appliance. You can configure the ISO image as a
datastore ISO file for the CD/DVD drive of the appliance by using the vSphere Client. See
vSphere Virtual Machine Administration.
n If you are patching the appliance from a repository URL, verify that you have configured
the repository settings and that the current repository URL is accessible. See Configure the
Repository for URL-Based Patching.

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n Create an image-based backup and take a powered-off snapshot of the vCenter Server
Appliance you are patching as a precaution in case there is a failure during the patching
process.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server Management Interface, click Update.

In the Current version details pane, you can view the vCenter Server version and build
number.

In the Available updates pane, you can view the available updates with update priority and
severity.

The update priority indicates how soon you must install the update. The values include:

n HIGH - Install as soon as possible.

n MEDIUM - Install at the earliest convenience.

n LOW - Install at your discretion.

The Update severity defines the severity of the issues fixed in the update. The values include
the following:

n CRITICAL - Vulnerabilities that can be exploited by an unauthenticated attacker from the

Internet or those that break the guest/host Operating System isolation. The exploitation
results in the complete compromise of confidentiality, integrity, and availability of
user data and/or processing resources without user interaction. Exploitation could be
leveraged to propagate an Internet worm or execute arbitrary code between Virtual
Machines and/or the Host Operating System.

n IMPORTANT - Vulnerabilities that are not rated critical but whose exploitation results
in the complete compromise of confidentiality and/or integrity of user data and/or
processing resources through user assistance or by authenticated attackers. This rating
also applies to those vulnerabilities which could lead to the complete compromise of
availability when exploitation is by a remote unauthenticated attacker from the Internet or
through a breach of virtual machine isolation.

n MODERATE - Vulnerabilities where the ability to exploit is mitigated to a significant

degree by configuration or difficulty of exploitation, but in certain deployment scenarios
could still lead to the compromise of confidentiality, integrity, or availability of user data
and/or processing resources.

n LOW - All other issues that have a security impact. Vulnerabilities where exploitation is
believed to be extremely difficult, or where successful exploitation would have minimal
impact.

2 Select the range of staged patches to apply and click Install.

Important Some updates might require a reboot of the system. You can see information
about these updates in the Available Updates pane.

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3 Read and accept the End User License Agreement.

4 A system pre-check verifies that the patches can be successfully installed with the provided
information.

If the pre-check discovers missing or incorrect information, or other problems preventing a

successful installation, you are prompted to correct the problem and resume the installation.

5 After the installation finishes, click OK.

6 If the patch installation requires the appliance to reboot, click Summary, and click Reboot to
reset the appliance.

Results

In the Available Updates pane, you can see the changed update status of the vCenter Server
appliance.

Enable Automatic Checks for vCenter Server Patches

You can configure vCenter Server to perform automatic checks for available patches in the
configured repository URL at a regular interval.

Prerequisites

n Log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface as root.

n Verify that you have configured the repository settings and that the current repository URL is
accessible. See Configure the Repository for URL-Based Patching.

Procedure

1 In the vCenter Server Management Interface, click Update.

2 Click Settings.

3 Select Check for updates automatically, and select the day and time in UTC to perform
automatic checks for available patches.

4 Click OK.

Results

vCenter Server appliance performs regular checks for available patches in the configured
repository URL. In the Available Updates pane, you can view information about the available
patches. You can also view the vCenter Server health status for notifications about available
patches. See vCenter Server Configuration.

Patching the vCenter Server Appliance by Using the Appliance Shell

You can use the software-packages utility in the appliance shell of a vCenter Server appliance
to see the installed patches, stage new patches, and install new patches.

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To perform ISO-based patching, you download an ISO image, mount the ISO image to the
CD/DVD drive of the appliance, optionally stage the available patches from the ISO image to
the appliance, and install the patches. For steps to mount the ISO image to the CD/DVD drive,
see Configure a Datastore ISO File for the CD/DVD Drive section in the vSphere Virtual Machine
Administration.

To perform URL-based patching, you optionally stage the available patches from a repository
URL to the appliance and install the patches. The vCenter Server appliance is preset with
a default VMware repository URL for the build profile of the appliance. You can use the
update.set command to configure the appliance to use the default VMware repository URL or
a custom repository URL, for example, a repository URL that you previously built on a local Web
server running within your data center. You can also use the proxy.set command to configure a
proxy server for the connection between the vCenter Server appliance and the repository URL.

View a List of All Installed Patches in the vCenter Server Appliance

You can use the software-packages utility to see a list of the patches currently applied to the
vCenter Server appliance. You can also view the list of the installed patches in chronological
order and details about a specific patch.

Procedure

1 Access the appliance shell and log in as a user who has a super administrator role.

The default user with a super administrator role is root.

2 To view the full list of patches and software packages installed in the vCenter Server
appliance, run the following command:

software-packages list

3 To view all patches applied to the vCenter Server appliance in chronological order, run the
following command:

software-packages list --history

You see the list in chronological order. A single patch in this list can be an update of multiple
different packages.

4 To view details about a specific patch, run the following command:

software-packages list --patch patch_name

For example, if you want to view the details about the VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-
Patch1 patch, run the following command:

software-packages list --patch VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-Patch1

You can see the complete list of details about the patch, such as vendor, description, and
installation date.

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Configure URL-Based Patching

For URL-based patching, the vCenter Server appliance is preset with a default VMware
repository URL for the build profile of the appliance. You can use the update.set command
to configure the appliance to use the default or a custom repository URL as the current source of
patches and enable automatic checks for patches.

By default the current repository for URL-based patching is the default VMware repository URL.

Note You can use the proxy.set command to configure a proxy server for the connection
between vCenter Server and the repository URL. For more information about the API commands
in the appliance shell, see vCenter Server Configuration.

If vCenter Server is not connected to the Internet or if your security policy requires it, you can
build and configure a custom repository. The custom patching repository runs on a local Web
server within your data center and replicates the data from the default repository. Optionally,
you can set up an authentication policy for accessing the Web server that hosts the custom
patching repository.

Procedure

1 If you want to configure a custom repository URL, build the repository on your local web
server.

a Log in to VMware Customer Connect at https://customerconnect.vmware.com/

downloads/#all_products.

b Select Download Product under VMware vSphere.

c Select the vCenter Server version from the Select Version drop-down.

d Against your license type, click GO TO DOWNLOADS in the row for VMware vCenter
Server.

e Download the VMware vCenter Server Appliance Update Bundle ZIP file.

f Confirm that the md5sum is correct by using an MD5 checksum tool.

g On your Web server, create a repository directory under the root.

For example, create the vc_update_repo directory.

h Extract the ZIP file into the repository directory.

The extracted files are in the manifest and package-pool subdirectories.

2 Access the appliance shell and log in as a user who has a super administrator role.

The default user with a super administrator role is root.

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3 To see information about the current URL-based patching settings, run the update.get
command.

You can see information about the current repository URL, the default repository URL, the
time at which the appliance last checked for patches, the time at which the appliance last
installed patches, and the current configuration of automatic checks for patches.

4 Configure the current repository for URL-based patching.

n To configure the appliance to use the default VMware repository URL, run the following
command:

update.set --currentURL default

n To configure the appliance to use a custom repository URL, run the following command:

update.set --currentURL https://web_server_name.your_company.com/vc_update_repo [--

username username] [--password password]

The square brackets [] enclose the command options.

If the custom repository requires authentication, use the --username username and --
password password options.

5 To activate automatic checks for vCenter Server appliance patches in the current repository
URL at regular intervals, run the following command:

update.set --CheckUpdates enabled [--day day] [--time HH:MM:SS]

The square brackets [] enclose the command options.

Use the --day day option to set the day for performing the regular checks for patches. You
can set a particular day of the week, for example, Monday, or Everyday. The default value is
Everyday.

Use the --time HH:MM:SS option to set the time in UTC for performing the regular checks for
patches. The default value is 00:00:00.

The appliance performs regular checks for available patches in the current repository URL.

6 To deactivate automatic checks for vCenter Server patches, run the following command:

update.set --CheckUpdates disabled

What to do next

If you configured the appliance to perform automatic checks for available patches, you can
regularly view the vCenter Server appliance health status for notifications about available
patches. See vCenter Server Configuration.

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Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance

Before you install available patches, you can stage the patches to the appliance. You can use the
software-packages utility to stage patches either from a local repository by attaching an ISO
image to the appliance, or from a remote repository directly by using a repository URL.

Prerequisites

n If you are staging patches from an ISO image that you previously downloaded from https://
my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch, you must attach the ISO image to the CD/DVD drive
of the vCenter Server appliance. You can configure the ISO image as a datastore ISO file for
the CD/DVD drive of the appliance by using the vSphere Client. See vSphere Virtual Machine
Administration.
n If you are staging patches from a remote repository, verify that you have configured the
repository settings and that the current repository URL is accessible. See Configure URL-
Based Patching.

Procedure

1 Access the appliance shell and log in as a user who has a super administrator role.

The default user with a super administrator role is root.

2 Stage the patches.

n To stage the patches included in the attached ISO image, run the following command:

software-packages stage --iso

n To stage the patches included in the current repository URL, run the following command:

software-packages stage --url

By default the current repository URL is the default VMware repository URL.

If you want to stage only the third-party patches, use the --thirdParty option.

n To stage the patches included in a repository URL that is not currently configured in the
appliance, run the following command:

software-packages stage --url URL_of_the_repository

If you want to stage only the third-party patches, use the --thirdParty option.
If you want to directly accept the End User License Agreement, use the --acceptEulas
option.
For example, to stage only the third-party patches from the current repository URL with
directly accepting the End User License Agreement, run the following command:

software-packages stage --url --thirdParty --acceptEulas

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In the process of staging, the command validates that a patch is a VMware patch, that the
staging area has enough free space, and that the patches are not altered. Only completely
new patches or patches for existing packages that can be upgraded are staged.

3 (Optional) To see information about the staged patches, run the following command:

software-packages list --staged

Each patch includes a metadata file that contains information such as patch version, product
name, whether a restart of the system is required, and so on.

4 (Optional) To view a list of the staged patches, run the following command:

software-packages list --staged --verbose

5 (Optional) To unstage the staged patches, run the following command:

software-packages unstage

All directories and files generated by the staging process are removed.

What to do next

Install the staged patches. See Install vCenter Server Patches.

Important If you staged the patches from an ISO image, keep the ISO image attached to the
CD/DVD drive of the appliance. The ISO image must be attached to the CD/DVD drive of the
appliance throughout the staging and installation processes.

Install vCenter Server Patches

You can use the software-packages utility to install the staged patches. You can also use the
software-packages utility to install patches directly from an attached ISO image or repository
URL without staging the patch payload.

Important The services running in the appliance become unavailable during the installation of
the patches. You must perform this procedure during a maintenance period. As a precaution in
case of failure, you can back up the vCenter Server appliance. For information about backing up
and restoring vCenter Server, see vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

Prerequisites

n If you are installing staged patches, verify that you staged the correct patch payload. See
Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance.

n If you are installing patches that you previously staged from an ISO image, verify that the ISO
image is attached to the CD/DVD drive of the vCenter Server appliance. See Stage Patches
to the vCenter Server Appliance.

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n If you are installing patches directly from an ISO image that you previously downloaded
from https://my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch, you must attach the ISO image to the
CD/DVD drive of the vCenter Server Appliance. You can configure the ISO image as a
datastore ISO file for the CD/DVD drive of the appliance by using the vSphere Client. See
vSphere Virtual Machine Administration.
n If you are installing patches directly from a repository, verify that you have configured the
repository settings and that the current repository URL is accessible. See Configure URL-
Based Patching.

n Create an image-based backup and take a powered-off snapshot of the vCenter Server
Appliance you are patching as a precaution in case there is a failure during the patching
process.

Procedure

1 Access the appliance shell and log in as a user who has a super administrator role.

The default user with a super administrator role is root.

2 Install the patches.

n To install staged patches, run the following command:

software-packages install --staged

n To install patches directly from an attached ISO image, run the following command:

software-packages install --iso

n To install patches directly from the current repository URL, run the following command:

software-packages install --url

By default the current repository URL is the default VMware repository URL.

n To install patches directly from a repository URL that is not currently configured, run the
following command:

software-packages install --url URL_of_the_repository

If you want to directly accept the End User License Agreement, use the --acceptEulas
option.
For example, to install patches from the current repository URL without staging the patches
with directly accepting the End User License Agreement, run the following command:

software-packages install --url --acceptEulas

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3 If the patch installation requires a reboot of the appliance, run the following command to
reset the appliance.

shutdown now -r "patch reboot"

Patching a vCenter High Availability Environment

To patch a vCenter Server Appliance configured in a vCenter High Availability (HA) cluster,
you must remove the vCenter Server High Availability configuration and delete the Passive and
Witness nodes. After patching the vCenter Server Appliance, you must re-create your vCenter
Server High Availability clusters.

This procedure describes how to remove the vCenter HA configuration.

Procedure

1 In the vSphere Client, log in to the vCenter Server from which you want to remove the
vCenter HA configuration.

2 Click the Configure tab, and select vCenter HA.

3 Select Remove vCenter HA .

n The vCenter HA cluster's configuration is removed from the Active, Passive, and Witness
nodes.

n The Active node continues to run as a standalone vCenter Server Appliance.

4 Delete the Passive and Witness nodes.

What to do next

Patch the vCenter Server Appliance as described in either Patching vCenter Server Using the
vCenter Server Management Interface or Patching the vCenter Server Appliance by Using the
Appliance Shell.

After patching the vCenter Server Appliance, you can configure vCenter HA. For information
about configuring vCenter HA, see vSphere Availability.

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Troubleshooting a vSphere
Upgrade 8
The installation and upgrade software enables you to identify problems on the host machine that
can cause an installation, upgrade, or migration to fail.

For interactive installations, upgrades, and migrations, the errors or warnings are displayed on
the final panel of the installer, where you are asked to confirm or cancel the installation or
upgrade. For scripted installations, upgrades, or migrations, the errors or warnings are written to
the installation log file. You can also consult the product release notes for known problems.

vSphere Update Manager provides custom messages for these errors or warnings. To see the
original errors and warnings returned by the precheck script during an Update Manager host
upgrade scan, review the Update Manager log file vmware-vum-server-log4cpp.log.

The vSphere Ugrade guide describes how to use VMware products and their features. If you
encounter problems or error situations that are not described in this guide, you may find a
solution in VMware Knowledge Base. You can also use VMware Community Forums to find
others with same problem or ask for help, or you can open Support Request to get help from
VMware service professional.

Read the following topics next:

n Collect Installation Logs for vCenter Server Appliance

n Errors and Warnings Returned by the Installation and Upgrade Precheck Script

n Upgrade Issues with vCenter Server Containing Host Profiles

n Roll Back a vCenter Server Instance on Windows When vCenter Server Upgrade Fails

n Collect Logs to Troubleshoot ESXi Hosts

Collect Installation Logs for vCenter Server Appliance

You can collect installation log files and check these files to identify the source of a failure if
vCenter Server appliance stops responding during initial startup.

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Procedure

1 Access the vCenter Server appliance shell.

Option Description

If you have direct access to the Press Alt+F1.

appliance

To connect remotely Use SSH or another remote console connection to start a session to the
appliance.

2 Enter a user name and password that the appliance recognizes.

3 In the appliance shell, run the pi shell command to access the Bash shell.

4 In the Bash shell, run the vc-support.sh script to generate a support bundle.

This command generates a .tgz file in /storage/log.

5 Export the generated support bundle to the user@x.x.x.x:/tmp folder.

scp /var/tmp/vc-etco-vm-vlan11-dhcp-63-151.eng.vmware.com-2014-02-28--21.11.tgz
user@x.x.x.x:/tmp

6 Determine which firstboot script failed.

cat /var/log/firstboot/firstbootStatus.json

What to do next

To identify potential causes of the failure, examine the log file of the firstboot script that failed.

Errors and Warnings Returned by the Installation and

Upgrade Precheck Script
The installation and upgrade precheck script runs tests to identify problems on the host machine
that can cause an installation, upgrade, or migration to fail.

For interactive installations, upgrades, and migrations, the errors or warnings are displayed on
the final screen of the GUI installer, where you are asked to confirm or cancel the installation or
upgrade. For scripted installations, upgrades, or migrations, the errors and warnings are written
to the installation log file.

vSphere Update Manager provides custom messages for these errors or warnings. To see the
original errors and warnings returned by the precheck script during an Update Manager host
upgrade scan, review the Update Manager log file vmware-vum-server-log4cpp.log.

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Table 8-1. Error and Warning Codes That Are Returned by the Installation and Upgrade Precheck
Script

Error or Warning Description

64BIT_LONGMODESTATUS The host processor must be 64-bit.

COS_NETWORKING Warning. An IPv4 address was found on an enabled

service console virtual NIC that has no corresponding
address in the same subnet in the VMkernel. A separate
warning appears for each such occurrence.

CPU_CORES The host must have at least two cores.

DISTRIBUTED_VIRTUAL_SWITCH If the Cisco Virtual Ethernet Module (VEM) software is

found on the host, the test checks that the upgrade
also contains the VEM software. The test also determines
whether the upgrade supports the same version of the
Cisco Virtual Supervisor Module (VSM) as the existing
version on the host. If the software is missing or is
compatible with a different version of the VSM, the test
returns a warning. The result indicates which version of
the VEM software was expected on the upgrade ISO and
which versions, if any, were found. You can use ESXi
Image Builder CLI to create a custom installation ISO that
includes the appropriate version of the VEM software.

HARDWARE_VIRTUALIZATION Warning. If the host processor does not have hardware

virtualization, or if hardware virtualization is not turned
on in the host BIOS, host performance reduces.
You can enable hardware virtualization in the host
machine boot options panel. See your hardware vendor's
documentation.

MD5_ROOT_PASSWORD This test checks that the root password is encoded

in MD5 format. If a password is not encoded in MD5
format, it might be significant only to eight characters.
In this case, any characters after the first eight are no
longer authenticated after the upgrade, which can create
a security problem. To work around this problem, see
Knowledge Base article KB 1024500.

MEMORY_SIZE The host requires the specified amount of memory to

upgrade.

PACKAGE_COMPLIANCE vSphere Update Manager upgrade to vSphere Lifecycle

Manager only. This test checks the existing software on
the host against the software contained on the upgrade
ISO to determine whether the host has been successfully
upgraded. If any of the packages are missing or are
an older version than the package on the upgrade ISO,
the test returns an error. The test results indicate which
software was found on the host and which software was
found on the upgrade ISO.

PARTITION_LAYOUT You can upgrade or migrate software only if at most one

VMFS partition on the disk is being upgraded. The VMFS
partition must begin after sector 1843200.

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Table 8-1. Error and Warning Codes That Are Returned by the Installation and Upgrade Precheck
Script (continued)

Error or Warning Description

POWERPATH This test checks for the installation of EMC PowerPath

software, consisting of a CIM module and a kernel module.
If either of these components is found on the host, the
test checks that matching components, such as CIM or the
VMkernel and module, also exist in the upgrade. If they do
not exist, the test returns a warning that indicates which
PowerPath components were expected on the upgrade
ISO and which, if any, were found.

PRECHECK_INITIALIZE This test checks that the precheck script can be run.

SANE_ESX_CONF The /etc/vmware/esx.conf file must exist on the host.

SPACE_AVAIL_ISO vSphere Update Manager only. The host disk must have
enough free space to store the contents of the installer
CD or DVD.

SPACE_AVAIL_CONFIG vSphere Update Manager upgrade to vSphere Lifecycle

Manager only. The host disk must have enough free
space to store the legacy configuration between reboots.

SUPPORTED_ESX_VERSION You can upgrade or migrate to ESXi 8.0 only from version
6.0 ESXi hosts.

TBOOT_REQUIRED This message applies only to vSphere Update Manager

upgrade to vSphere Lifecycle Manager only. The upgrade
fails with this error when the host system is running in
trusted boot mode (tboot), but the ESXi upgrade ISO
does not contain any tboot VIBs. This test prevents an
upgrade that can make the host less secure.

UNSUPPORTED_DEVICES Warning. This test checks for unsupported devices. Some

PCI devices are not supported in ESXi 8.0.

UPDATE_PENDING This test checks the host for VIB installations that require
a reboot. This test fails if one or more such VIBs are
installed, but the host has not yet been rebooted. In these
conditions, the precheck script is unable to determine
reliably which packages are currently installed on the
host. If this test fails, it may not be safe to rely on the rest
of the precheck tests to determine whether an upgrade is
safe.
If you encounter this error, restart the host and retry the
upgrade.

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Upgrade Issues with vCenter Server Containing Host Profiles

Most common issues that might occur during a vCenter Server upgrade to version 8.0, that
contains host profiles.

n For issues occurring during a vCenter Server upgrade or ESXi upgrade, see Troubleshooting
a vSphere Upgrade.
n If upgrading vCenter Server 6.7 or 7.0, containing host profiles with version earlier than 6.7,
results with a failure, see KB 52932.

n For error There is no suitable host in the inventory as reference host for the
profile Host Profile. The profile does not have any associated reference host, see
KB 2150534.

n If an error occurs when you import a host profile to an empty vCenter Server inventory, see
vSphere Host Profiles for Reference Host is Unavailable.
n If a host profile compliance check fails for NFS datastore, see vSphere Host Profiles for Host
Profile without NFS Datastore.

n If compliance check fails with an error for the UserVars.ESXiVPsDisabledProtocols option,

when an ESXi host upgraded to version 8.0 is attached to a host profile with version 6.7, see
VMware vSphere 8.0 Release Notes.

Roll Back a vCenter Server Instance on Windows When

vCenter Server Upgrade Fails
You can roll back or restore a vCenter Server instance on Windows when an upgrade of vCenter
Server with an external Platform Services Controller fails after the export stage and the legacy
environment has been uninstalled.

Prerequisites

The roll back or restore of vCenter Server applies when all of the following conditions apply:

n You must have access to the vCenter Server for Windows machine.

n The vCenter Server instance is attached to an external Platform Services Controller.

n The upgrade of the vCenter Server instance attached to the Platform Services Controller
instance is in a failed state after the export stage and uninstallation of the legacy vCenter
Server.

n Ensure that vCenter Server rollback happened properly in case of upgrade failure and that no
stale failed upgrade log entries remain.

For Rollback Method 1:

n To clean up vCenter Server appliance 7.0 data from the legacy Platform Services Controller,
see KB 2106736.

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n Use a vCenter Server database snapshot taken before the start of the vCenter Server
upgrade.

For Rollback Method 2:

n Use a powered off snapshot of the vCenter Server before the vCenter Server upgrade.

n Use a Platform Services Controller snapshot taken after the Platform Services Controller node
upgrade and before the start of the vCenter Server upgrade.

n Use a vCenter Server snapshot taken after the Platform Services Controller upgrade and
before the start of the vCenter Server upgrade.

Procedure

u You can restore the legacy vCenter Server using Rollback Method 1 or Rollback Method 2.

n Use Rollback Method 1.

a Manually clean up vCenter Server appliance data from Platform Services Controller.

b Restore the legacy vCenter Server database from a backup which was taken before
the upgrade.

c Point the legacy vCenter Server instance to the Platform Services Controller, and also
point to the database with the restored data.

d Ensure that the vCenter Server services are up and running.

n Use Rollback Method 2.

a Restore the Platform Services Controller instance from a snapshot to the point where
you were about to start vCenter Server upgrade. You can use a backup for a
Windows configuration or use another backup and restore approach to revert the
snapshot.

b Restore the vCenter Server instance from a snapshot.

c Restore the vCenter Server database from a snapshot.

d Ensure that the vCenter Server services are up and running.

For Rollback Method 2, you will lose all data written to Platform Services Controller after
the vCenter Server upgrade has been started when you restore from the Platform Services
Controller snapshot taken before that point in time.

Collect Logs to Troubleshoot ESXi Hosts

You can collect installation or upgrade log files for ESXi that help you identify the source of the
failure if an installation or upgrade fails.

Solution

1 Enter the vm-support command in the ESXi Shell or through SSH.

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2 Navigate to the /var/tmp/ directory.

3 Retrieve the log files from the .tgz file.

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