ESXi host upgrades via vSphere Update Manager (VUM, now Lifecycle Manager in newer versions) are routine operations that usually go smoothly. When they don’t, the failure modes can range from easily recoverable to genuinely painful. Here’s what I’ve encountered and how to handle it. Before You Start The things that should happen before any ESXi … Read more
ESXi 5.5 reached end of general support in September 2018, creating real urgency to move environments that had been running the same version for three to four years. The upgrade path to 6.5 (the stable target at the time) had some gotchas that weren’t clearly documented in a single place. Here’s what the actual upgrade … Read more
A failed vCenter upgrade is among the more stressful VMware events you’ll deal with. The VMs are still running, HA and DRS are still functioning on cached state, but vCenter itself is in an inconsistent state between versions and things are subtly broken in ways that compound over time. Here’s what to do. How Failed … Read more