Upgrading VLR9.0.5.1 to VLR9.1.0.0100 fails

Products

• VMware Site Recovery Manager

Issue/Introduction

* VLR log:   /opt/vmware/support/logs/va-config/va-config.log

....a-hbrsrv-dpca-9.1.0-0.25250047.i386.rpm /mnt/cdrom/update/package-pool/zlib-1.2.13-5.ph5.x86_64.rpm
--> 1. package zlib-devel-1.2.13-4.ph5.x86_64 requires zlib = 1.2.13-4.ph5, but none of the providers can be installed
--> Found 1 problem(s) while resolving --> Error(1301) :
Solv general runtime error -->
2026-07-22T11:11:16.024Z verbose va-config[02164] [VaConfig@6876 sub=Installing packages opID=d####=####=####=####-installUpdate:ad] Command "/usr/bin/bash -x /tmp/updat e/9.1.0.0100/install.sh" exit code: 21

Environment

VMware Live Site Recovery 9.0.5.x

Cause

• If the /etc/yum.repos.d/photon-updates.repo parm enabled is set to 0, the appliance goes online to pull packages from the online Photon repository.  Various packages updates may conflict with the iso installer packages.
  
  
• The zlib-devel package has already been installed from a previous online update and the iso does not want to overwrite it.

Resolution

• Snapshot the VLR appliance.
  
  
• On VLR ssh session verify if the zlib-devel pckage exists. 
  
   # rpm -q zlib-devel
  
     (we might see zlib-devel-1.2.13-4.ph5 rpm/package)
  
  
• On VLR ssh session remove the zlib-devel package manually
  
       # /usr/bin/tdnf remove -y --disablerepo='*' zlib-devel
  
             or manually,
  
      # tdnf remove -y zlib-devel
  
  
• On VLR ssh session ensure the photon-updates.repo is still disabled
    
    # grep enabled /etc/yum.repos.d/photon-updates.repo
       enabled=0
  
  
  
•  Retry the VLR update/upgrade workflow again.

Additional Information

• The primary issue here, is that the VLR appliance may have the photon-updates.repo set to enabled=1    ( default ) 
  
  
• This causes an online Photon update action to pull packages from the Photon repository when upgrading via iso. Therefore, several library packages must be pulled unnecessarily.
  
  See KB445953 where the libgfortran package download caused a VLR9.0.5.0 to VLR9.0.5.1 upgrade failure,  and the following upgrade from VLR9.0.5.1 to VLR9.2.1.0100 failed on zlib-devel package and had to be similarly removed.
  
  
  NB: Ensure /etc/yum.repos.d/photon-updates.repo : enabled=0 before iso in-place upgrade attempt from 9.0.5.x