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As written in a previous post, starting from vSphere 5.0U1 in a HA cluster the VM Startup & Shutdown ESXi host properties is disabled. Anyway wasn’t supported, because according with the vSphere Avalability Guide and also the KB 850 (Automating the process of starting and stopping virtual machines on VMware ESX): The Virtual Machine Startup [...]

VMware vSphere 5.x According with KB 2006859 (Windows 8 / Windows Server 2012 Operating System does not boot or install on ESXi or ESX) Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 VMs are fully supported for ESXi 5.1, ESXi 5.1 U1, ESXi 5.0 U1 and ESXi 5.0 U2. Note: For Windows Server 2012, you must install [...]

Finally there are several other aspects to consider: backup software, storage plugins, vSphere client, … Backup The backup software must be compatible with vSphere 5.1, so check it before the upgrade procedure. Actually most of the backup software vendors have version for vSphere 5.1, but note that old backup software may be not compatible.

After that the vCenter and the ESXi part are upgrade, you can work on the VM part. The VM upgrade is the easy part, but it require VM downtime, so must be planned well. There are two different upgrade for the VM part: VMware Tools (highly recommended) Virtual Hardware (optional)

After the vCenter Server (described in the previous post) and the VUM part (this could a simple upgrade, by keeping the existing DB, or a re-install), you can go through the ESXi part. A re-install from scratch could be simple, but you may loose some information (unless you use Host Profiles). For more information see [...]

The installation or the upgrade procedure of vCenter Server components are quite similar. Starting from version 5.1 there are more components, so you can use the Simple Mode install or upgrade SSO, Inventory and vCenter services in different (but sequential) steps. I’ve used the Simple Mode for new installation and for upgrade from 5.0 without [...]

The upgrade path to vSphere 5.1 is quite similar to the upgrade path to vSphere 5.0 and is well described in the specific guide (vSphere Upgrade Guide). In some cases an in-place upgrade can be applied with the advantage to require less time and to keep all (or most) of the settings and configurations. For [...]

I’ve got a case of a host upgraded to VMware vSphere 5.1 with a determinist PSOD during each host reboot or shutdown (I’ve found the issue during the first patch update). No difference if hosts where rebuild from scratch with a similar configuration. And no difference with all recent ESXi patches. After a full upgrade [...]

There are different reason where you can you loose or corrupt your partition table of your VMFS volumes: resignature from another system (for example the backup server, if connected in SAN mode), a human mistake (datastore / delete), or maybe some storage issues. In this case usually the VMFS partition is still there and also [...]

As written in the previous post, one common issue with recent servers of new generations is that maybe the NIC drivers are not included in the standard ESXi ISO. An if you use the vendor (or a personal) customized ISO, could be possible that during a patch update or a version upgrade you loose the [...]

If you have a new NIC card or a server of a new generation could be possible that the right driver is missing in the standard ESXi installation ISO. And without a working networking is not possible install the ESXi (the installation will stop because one requirement is at least a supported NIC). Maybe the [...]

VMware vSphere 5.1 There is a good post with a complete reference for all vSphere products: Configuring CA signed certificates for VMware vCenter Server 5.0.x – http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2015421 Configuring CA signed SSL certificates for vSphere Update Manager in vCenter 5.1 – http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2037581 Creating certificate requests and certificates for the vCenter 5.1 components – http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2037432 Configuring CA [...]