On 7.0 vCenter, upgrade to future ESXi versions is currently not supported through ISO due to a known limitation in 7.0 vCenter

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:
ESXi upgrade to version greater than 7.0 using vSphere Lifecycle Manager upgrade baseline on 7.0 vCenter Server fails. If the ESXi hosts has entered into dual component situation, as suggested by VC U3C pre-check, the customer will not be able to use ISO method of upgrade for ESXi hosts.

If you create an upgrade baseline by using vSphere Lifecycle Manager with ISO image version greater than 7.0 and attempt to upgrade ESXi hosts on vCenter Server, it fails. In vSphere Client, an error is displayed "Upgrade is not supported for host”.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 7.0.0

Cause

This is a known limitation of 7.0 vCenter Sever hence, has to be handled differently.

Resolution

The issue has been addressed in vCenter versions greater than 7.0 and will allow the user to follow the described method in vCenter Server 7.0 U3C pre-check.

Workaround:

To workaround this issue perform an U3c upgrade on hosts flagged by the precheck using one of the following methods:

1. Add the hosts into another VC that is greater than 7.0.0 (e.g. 7.0U2) as standalone hosts or as a part of non-HA VUM cluster, upgrade the hosts using ISO upgrade baseline. After upgrade is finished, add the hosts back to the original VC, or keep them managed by the new VC.
2. On each host perform an esxcli profile upgrade to 7.0.U3C.

Retry the VC upgrade.

Note: Rollup upgrade hosts to U3c with VCenter less than U3c may fail with "esxupdate error -1", ISO upgrade is recommended.