Easy ESXi 5.5 upgrade via command line
ESXi 5.5 was just released general availability (GA) on Sunday (9/22) and I’m itching to upgrade the home lab to run the latest version with all it’s goodies. I wanted to try upgrading my hosts without having to go through the same process that I followed setting up ESXi on the NUC in the first place, injecting custom NIC drivers, etc.
Enter the command line…
- Move all VM’s from the host and then put the host into Maintenance Mode.
- Go to the Configuration tab > Security Profile and Enable SSH under Services.
- Under Firewall, enable httpClient (outbound http).
- Open PuTTY (or other SSH client) and SSH into your host.
- Type the following command to download and install the update:
esxcli software profile update -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml -p ESXi-5.5.0-1331820-standard - Depending on your internet connection, this could take just a few minutes or longer. Once finished you should see the following:
- Reboot your host then verify ESXi 5.5 is installed:
- note: I did have to restart the virtualcenter service in order for the Web Client to show the updated version number.
That’s it, it’s as simple as that! Because I ran the UPDATE command and not the INSTALL command, my existing injected NIC drivers for the Intel NUC remained in place. So a quick and easy upgrade for hosts with no CD-ROM or ability to virtually mount a CD image.
UPDATE:
View available upgrades
The steps above work perfectly for when you want to upgrade to ESXi 5.5, but what about when newer versions come out or you want to apply a different update? Simply run this command to view all available image profiles in the depot:
esxcli software sources profile list -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml
Then replace the file name in the command from Step 5 with the new/other image profile of your choice.
