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The below list of one-liner SSH commands allow all ESXi enthusiasts to get to the very latest ESXi version (or any particular version) at any time. Seriously easy, much like apt get
in Linux. Yes, even these folks:
- users of the Free Hypervisor
(limited functionality) - sysadmins for small labs with ESXi only and no vCenter or VCSA, thus, no VMware Update Manager (VUM), the preferred way to upgrade
- VMUG Advantage EVALExperience Subscribers, well worth every penny
(full functionality, no need to rebuild, just re-up every year)
Let that sink in for a moment. It doesn't really matter that the Free Hypervisor and EVALExperience download sites aren't updated very often, you don't have to wait to get the latest version of the ESXi Hypervisor! For example, you can easily test the very latest Hypervisor-Specific Mitigations in Build 9484548, as described in KB 55636 from Aug 14 2018's VMware Security Advisory VMSA-2018-0020 and VMSA-2018-0021 – L1 Terminal Fault (L1TF): CVE-2018-3646, CVE-2018-3620, and CVE-2018-3615.
Warning!
All operating system/hypervisor upgrades come with risks, including the slight possibility of losing your network connections and access to your VMs.
Proceed only after:
- Reading the entire article below that includes crucial usage instructions, risk reduction, and troubleshooting
- AND updating your VCSA [there's even a walk-thru video]
- AND backing up your hypervisor [there's even a walk-thru video].
Permalink
Any bolded section below can be right-clicked to 'Copy link address' then share, since sharing the ESXCLI command directly on social or discussion may ruin the formatting, and/or lose all context.
TinkerTry's comprehensive list of ESXCLI commands below includes all VMware vSphere ESXi 6.5.x and ESXi 6.7.x versions.
See also VMware ESXi Patch Tracker.
Version Release Name | Release Date | Build Number
ESXi 6.7 U2 ESXi 6.7 U2 04/11/2019 13006603 N/A
Release Notes.
ESXi 6.7 EP 06 ESXi670-201901001 01/17/2019 11675023 N/A
Release Notes.
ESXi 6.7 EP 05 ESXi670-201811001 11/09/2018 10764712 N/A
Release Notes.
ESXi 6.7 U1 ESXi 6.7 U1 10/16/2018 10302608 N/A
Release Notes.
ESXi 6.7 EP 04 ESXi670-201810001 10/02/2018 10176752
ESXi 6.7 EP 03 ESXi670-201808001 8/14/2018 9484548
ESXi 6.7 EP 02a ESXi670-201807001 7/26/2018 9214924
ESXi 6.7 EP 02 ESXi670-201806001 6/28/2018 8941472
ESXi 6.7 GA ESXi 6.7 GA 4/17/2018 8169922
ESXi 6.5 EP9 ESXi650-201806001 10/02/2018 10175896
ESXi 6.5 U2b ESXi650-201806001 6/28/2018 8935087
ESXi 6.5 U2 GA ESXi 6.5 U2 GA 5/3/2018 8294253
ESXi 6.5 U1g ESXi650-201803001 3/20/2018 7967591
ESXi 6.5 Patch 02 ESXi650-201712001 12/19/2017 7388607
ESXi 6.5 U1 Express Patch 4 ESXi650-201710001 10/5/2017 6765664
ESXi 6.5 U1 ESXi 6.5 U1 7/27/2017 5969303
ESXi 6.5.0d ESXi650-201704001 4/18/2017 5310538
ESXi 6.5. Express Patch 1a ESXi650-201703002 3/28/2017 5224529
ESXi 6.5. Patch 01 ESXi650-201703001 3/9/2017 5146846
ESXi 6.5.0 a ESXi650-201701001 2/2/2017 4887370
ESXi 6.5 GA ESXi 6.5 GA 11/15/2016 4564106
I might extend this list back to 6.0, leave a comment if that effort is of interest to you.
Detailed Instructions
If you skim through The Difference Between An ESXi Patch, Express Patch, and Update, and the VMware Patch Portal (which is where I manually harvested the profiles from), it can be a bit tough to figure out what's what. Guess what. Even when whatever latest emergency patch arrives such as Aug 14 2018's release of VMware Security Advisory VMSA-2018-0020 and VMSA-2018-0021 – L1 Terminal Fault (L1TF): CVE-2018-3646, CVE-2018-3620, and CVE-2018-3615, this article will be ready for you quickly, with me just needing to prepend a new one-liner ESXCLI command each time a new ESXi build appears. I already get notified automatically by signing up for Security Advisories here, apparently so does Alex Lopez @iVirtuAlex, who tweeted it out within 1 minute of the email arriving!
Let's start with this new Aug 14 2018 ESXi build, for example. The potential vulnerability it's intended to mitigate might not be quite so important in a home lab, but perhaps you want to give it a go for testing purposes. What better place to learn than in a lab? Besides, you do back up your ESXi before messing with it, don't you?
This Build 9484548 is so new it hasn't shown up on the handy VMware KB article Build numbers and versions of VMware ESXi/ESX (2143832) quite yet. But there is a rather universal way to download and install it, in one command. Works great if your ESXi host has internet access. William Lam and Andreas Peetz have actually blogged about using esxcli for ESXi updates back in 2012 here and here. This article revisits that particular technique. Why, even in this day and age when VCSA has VUM baked in? Because of its universality, and because it removes the need for folks to do crazy stuff to workaround My VMware login issues or entitlement/permissions issues.
Yeah, it's that easy! While you do have to temporarily enable SSH on your ESXi host(s) first for remote access over SSH. You really should read this ENTIRE article before upgrading. Why? Well, if you rush, you may find yourself with ESXi 6.5 Update 2, which has no valid upgrade path to ESXi 6.7 currently. Yeah, details matter, so be very careful out there!
You should be updating your VCSA before your ESXi, see how at TinkerTry:
- How to easily update your VMware vCenter Server Appliance from 6.x to 6.7 (VCSA 6.7 Build 8217866)
Apr 18 2018
You may also want to read Eric Siebert's Important information to know before upgrading to vSphere 6.7 and Brandon Lee's VMware vSphere ESXi 6.7 New Features Installing and Upgrading.
The ESXCLI method of updating is a more universal way to upgrade ESXi that works even for the free hypervisor. It's actually a one-liner that side-steps the preferred VUM method for those without VCSA, and/or those without a My VMware account or and expired trial, instead downloading the patch directly. This ESXCLI method doesn't have quite as easy a way to revert (aka roll-back) if things go wrong. If you have access to the latest ESXi ISO, downloading and booting from that and choosing Upgrade is safer. If you have VCSA 6.7, using vSphere Update Manager VUM is safer too. It's a lot more fun to have VCSA in your home lab, and doing so beyond the 60 day trial has gotten a whole lot more affordable too, with the 365 day renewable VMUG Advantage EVALExperience. See also VMware ESXi Upgrade.
Warning
I cannot feasibly provide support for your upgrade, especially given the variety of unsupported hardware out there, see full disclaimer below. This article is focused mostly on small home labs, and was voluntarily authored.
If you don't have a backup, and you don't have any support contract with VMware (such as VMUG Advantage EVALExperience), you are putting yourself at risk if you don't take a moment to back up your ESXi before proceeding, and note that I have full walk through video of free Windows software that allows you to do it.
Don't rush things. At a minimum, even for a home lab, you'll want to read this entire article before patching anything! Special thanks go out to VCDX 194 Matt Kozloski, whose invaluable feedback improved my recent update articles.
Step 1 - do your homework
VMware ESXI Release Notes
Read them all, for both the major release such as vSphere 6.7 Release Notes, and for the patch release, such as ESXi 6.7 EP 02a.
Step 2 - Follow Prerequisites
Once you've completed ALL of the following preparation steps:
- upgraded to the latest VCSA
- I tend to put my modern systems BIOs setting to UEFI mode (instead of Dual), see details here, as a bit of future proofing. You should also read Mike Foley's warnings in Secure Boot for ESXi 6.5 – Hypervisor Assurance
...
Possible upgrade issues
UEFI secure boot requires that the original VIB signatures are persisted. Older versions of ESXi do not persist the signatures, but the upgrade process updates the VIB signatures.If your host was upgraded using the ESXCLI command then your bootloader wasn’t upgraded and doesn’t persist the signatures. When you enable Secure Boot after the upgrade, an error occurs. You can’t use Secure Boot on these installations and will have to re-install from scratch to gain that support.
... - Backed up the ESXi 6.x hypervisor you've already installed and configured, for easy roll-back in case things go wrong. If it's on USB or SD, it's best to clone to a new USB drive and boot from it, to be sure your 'backup' is good, it's all explained at USB Image Tool for Windows easily backs up and restores your complete VMware ESXi hypervisor on USB or SD flash drives, a simple/free clone for peace of mind before patching or upgrading.
If you don't wish to do either, at least follow this VMware KB article:
• How to back up ESXi host configuration (2042141) - Ensured your ESXi 6.x host has a working internet connection.
- Read this entire article, yes, even the entire set of prerequisites above.
Step 3 - Perform Upgrade using VUM (vSphere Update Manager)
Helpful for folks who have VCSA already installed and configured. Instructions here and here.
- OR -
Step 3 - Perform Upgrade using ESXCLI
Step-by-Step Instructions
Download and upgrade to the latest VMware ESXI using the patch bundle that comes directly from the VMware Online Depot
The entire process including reboot is usually well under 10 minutes, and many of the steps below are optional, making it appear more difficult than it is. Triple-clicking on a line of code below highlights the whole thing with a carriage return, so you can then right-click and copy it into your clipboard, which gets executed immediately upon pasting into your SSH session. If you want to edit the line before it's executed, manually swipe your mouse across each line of code with no trailing spaces at the end.
Open an SSH session (eg. PuTTY) to your ESXi 6.x server
(if you forgot to enable SSH, here's how)OPTIONAL - Turn on Maintenance Mode - Or you can just be sure to manually shutdown all the VMs gracefully that you care about, including VCSA. These instructions are geared to a home lab without High Availability enabled. This is also a good time to ensure you've also set ESXi host to automatically gracefully shutdown all VMs upon host reboot, or if you don't use vCenter or VCSA, use this Host Client method.
OPTIONAL - Reboot(Pro Tip courtesy of VCDX 194 Matt Kozloski) - Consider rebooting your ESXi server and maybe even a hard power cycle before updating. Matt explains:
if people are running on SD cards or USB sticks and they haven't rebooted the server in a LONG time to patch/update, I would strongly recommend doing a reboot of the server before applying any updates. I've seen, more than once, the SD card or the controller goes into some funky state and as ESXi is running largely in memory, it can comes up half patched or not patched at all. A [cold] reboot before update helps with that (again, if a server has been running for a long period of time - like a year+ - since it was rebooted last). Cold (remove the power cables) can be important, if the SD card or USB stick is actually running on an embedded controller like iLO or iDRAC.
OPTIONAL - See a list of all available ESXi profiles - VMware's Upgrade or Update a Host with Image Profiles documentation tells you how this command was formed. Paste the one line below into into your SSH session, then press enter:
You can cut-and-paste the output from the above command into a spreadsheet if you'd like, so you can then sort it, making it apparent which profile is the most recent.
Firewall allow outbound http requests - This command is likely not needed if you're upgrading from 6.5.x, and is here in case you get an error about https access. I'm trying to make these instructions applicable to the broadest set of readers. Paste the one line below into into your SSH session, then press enter:
More details about the firewall here.
Dry Run - Taking this extra step will help you be sure of what is about to happen, before it actually happens.
Here's the simple command to cut-and-paste into your SSH session:Copy and paste the results into a text editor and save it. If you see some VIBs that are going to be removed that you require, you'll need to be fully prepared to manually re-install them after the actual upgrade below. If it's a network VIB that is used for your ESXi service console, you'll want to be extra careful to re-install that same VIB before rebooting your just-patched host(s). Don't just assume some later VIB version will work fine with your hardware, use what you know works, and carefully double-check the VMware Compatibility Guide for the recommended/supported version of firmware and device driver.
ACTUAL RUN - This is it, the all-in-one download and patch command, assuming your ESXi host has internet access. This will pull down the ESXi Image Profile using https, then it will run the patch script.
When you paste this line into your SSH session and hit enter, you'll need to be patient, as nothing seems to happen at first. It will take somewhere between roughly 3 to 10 minutes before the completion screen (sample below) appears:- Firewall disallow outbound http requests - - To return your firewall to how it was before (optional) step 4 above, simply copy and paste the following:
OPTIONAL - Xeon D-1500 Owners Only - This workaround for odd Hardware Health readings was required for ESXi 6.5, but so far, Xeon D-1500 systems seem to work fine with 6.7 as-is, this is good! See also How to find NVMe SSD firmware versions in a VMware ESXi 6.5 Server. As for the Intel I350 1GbE and X557 10GbE NICs, the inbox (included) drivers in 6.7 itself seem to work fine as-is too, but there are certainly much newer drivers available, installable with this set of 3 commands. Yes, sorry about that, you will have to reboot before you'll be able to install that I350 driver.
Reboot - This is needed for the new hypervisor version to be loaded upon restart. You may want to watch the DCUI (local console) as it boots, to see if any errors show up.
OPTIONAL - If you turned on Maintenance Mode in step 3 above, you'll need to turn it off.
You're Done! - You may want to be continue with checking whether everything is working correctly after your systems is back up again, but you are done with the update itself. You can also watch DCUI during the boot if you'd like, to see if you spot any warnings.
Test things out - Log in with ESXi Host Client (pointing your browser directly at your IP address or ESXi servername), and be sure everything seems to function fine. You may need to re-map USB devices to VMs that use USB, and you may need to re-map VT-d (passthrough) devices to VMs that use passthrough devices like GPUs.
- You're Really Done! - If you're happy that everything seems to be working well, that's a wrap, but keep that backup, just in case you notice something odd later on.
Version Confirmation
Vmware Esxi 6.5 Free
Now that you've updated and rebooted, various UIs will show your ESXi version, depending upon where you look. Here's just an example below, your version numbers will vary.
Host Client:
Version: 6.7.0 (Build 9484548)
Image profile: (Updated) ESXi-6.5.0-4564106-standard (VMware, Inc.)
vSphere Web Client (Flash):
Hypervisor: VMware ESXi, 6.7.0, 9484548
Image Profile: (Updated) ESXi-6.5.0-4564106-standard
vSphere Client (HTML5):
Hypervisor: VMware ESXi, 6.7.0, 9484548
Image Profile: (Updated) ESXi-6.5.0-4564106-standard
SSH session to updated ESXi host:
VMware ESXi 6.7.0 build-9484548
VMware ESXi 6.7.0 GA
VMkernel xd-1541-5028d.lab.local 6.7.0 #1 SMP Release build-9484548 Aug 8 2018 12:22:30 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 ESXi
Notes for Xeon D Owners
- There is now BIOS 2.0 that includes Spectre mitigation that arrived in BIOS 1.3.
- The default ESXi 6.7 install works great! See also:
How to easily install VMware ESXi 6.7 on an Intel Xeon D Supermicro SuperServer - There may be a better, recommended I350 1GbE driver and/or a better X557 10GbE driver, but the default/included inbox drivers seem to work fine with preliminary initial tests. I have more homework to do there. There's also no longer any need to 'fix' odd RPM and temperature readings that were evident in 6.5, perhaps that SR# I filed finally paid off?
Video
Step-by-step video showing me upgrading a Xeon D from 6.5 to 6.7, in my home lab.
Closing thoughts
Honestly, I wish updates were even easier, with a vSphere Host Client mechanism available to anybody that would be similar to what VMware already does with the Photon OS based VCSA appliance, where you'll find an easy to use built-in 'Check Updates' function in VAMI. Even better would be automatic image backups, and easy roll-back.
If these notions actually become real someday, I'd be more than happy to have this article become completely obsolete, and I'd happily point folks to built-in product capabilities instead.
Disclaimer/Disclosure
I cannot feasibly provide support for your upgrade, especially given the variety of unsupported hardware out there, see full disclaimer at below-left. This article is focused mostly on small home labs, was voluntarily authored, and not associated with my employment at VMware. It is not official documentation. I work in the storage division, separate from the group developing and supporting the hypervisor.
Aug 17 2018 Update
I noticed that this great reference at virten.net:
now lists Build 9484548 as 6.7 EP3, so I've updated my table above accordingly, since VMware hasn't updated its Build numbers and versions of VMware ESXi/ESX (2143832) KB article yet.
Aug 19 2019 Update
Section above about Xeon D updated with newer VIBs for networking.
Apr 14 2019 Update
On my first test, I get this error, on a system that has been upgraded with ease many times before.
I found a work-around for this error here, reported by jjwatmyself at 3:30pm eastern time 2019-04-13 at TinkerTry here, but his suggestion didn't seem to work for me, see also set swap procedure at https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1007638.
This issue has also been reported by secconse in the VMware Communities here with this workaround:
So if that work-around works, it's not really swap at play here. I have not finished testing this yet, but I'm certainly hoping to find a more elegant way to address this error. This same problem struck some folks on 6.7 Update 1 too, it seems.
Any ideas? Drop a comment below.
Apr 28 2019 Update
Success! All I had to do was reboot after doing that swap file fix, then the next attempt to do the update worked just fine. Session transcript below.
See also at TinkerTry
- USB Image Tool for Windows easily backs up and restores your complete VMware ESXi hypervisor on USB or SD flash drives, a simple/free clone for peace of mind before patching or upgrading
Jun 14 2018
- How to download your VMUG Advantage EVALExperience VMware vSphere 6.7 VCSA and ESXi ISOs and 365 day license keys
May 04 2018
- How to easily update your VMware vCenter Server Appliance from 6.x to 6.7 (VCSA 6.7 Build 8217866)
Apr 18 2018
- VMware vSphere 6.7 announced today, here's how to download it right away
Apr 17 2018
- How to easily install VMware ESXi 6.7 on an Intel Xeon D Supermicro SuperServer
Apr 17 2018
- How to easily update your VMware Hypervisor from 6.x to 6.5 Update 1 Patch Release ESXi-6.5.0-20180304001-standard (ESXi Build 7967591) with Spectre mitigation
Mar 20 2018
- Supermicro SuperServer Xeon D-1500 Bundle mini-tower and 1U rack mount are finally on the VMware Compatibility Guide for ESXi 6.5U1
Mar 15 2018
- Introducing the 1U Supermicro SuperServer SYS-E300-9D featuring the new Intel Xeon D-2100, the only somewhat home lab friendly system announced
Mar 10 2018
- Meltdown and Spectre side-channel attack risk mitigation information from processor, server, and software vendors
Jan 10 2018
- How to find NVMe SSD firmware versions in a VMware ESXi 6.5 Server
Aug 05 2017
- My VMware's 'You either are not entitled or do not have permissions to download this product.' error, and what to do about it.
Mar 13 2014
See also
- VMware ESXi Upgrade
Upgrading Hosts That Have Third-Party Custom VIBs
A host can have custom vSphere installation bundles (VIBs) installed, for example, for third-party drivers or management agents. When you upgrade an ESXi host to 6.7, all supported custom VIBs are migrated, regardless of whether the VIBs are included in the installer ISO.
If the host or the installer ISO image contains a VIB that creates a conflict and prevents the upgrade, an error message identifies the VIB that created the conflict. To upgrade the host, take one of the following actions:Remove the VIB that created the conflict from the host and retry the upgrade. If you are using vSphere Update Manager, select the option to remove third-party software modules during the remediation process. For more information, see the Installing and Administering VMware vSphere Update Manager documentation. You can also remove the VIB that created the conflict from the host by using esxcli commands. For more information, see Remove VIBs from a Host.
- Use the vSphere ESXi Image Builder CLI to create a custom installer ISO image that resolves the conflict. For more information about vSphere ESXi Image Builder CLI installation and usage, see the vCenter Server Installation and Setup documentation.
which hasn't been updated for 6.7, but holds valuable information.
- VMware ESXi Patch Tracker
Nov 24 2016 by Andreas Peetz at VMware Front Experience
There is no 6.7 version of this document yet.
- Upgrade or Update a Host with Image Profiles
VMware Docs last updated 15 Sep 2016
Upgrade Log
Below, I've pasted the full text of my update. It will help you see what drivers are touched. Just use the horizontal scroll bar or shift + mousewheel to look around, and Ctrl+F to Find stuff quickly:
As also seen in my video, here's the full contents of my ssh session, as I completed my Xeon D-1541 upgrade from a fresh install of 6.5 that was from the original ISO, using no 3rd party VIBs:
Version: 6.5.0 (Build 4564106)
to:Version: 6.7.0 (Build 9484548)
Version: 6.7.0 (Build 9484548)
to:Version: 6.7.0 (Build 10176752)
Version: 6.7.0 (Build 10176752)
to:Version: 6.7.0 (Build 10302608)
Version: 6.7.0 (Build 11675023)
to:Version: 6.7.0 (Build 13006603)
Important Update - On Mar 20 2018, VMware VMSA-2018-0004.3 announced that CVE-2017-5715 (Spectre-2) mitigation is now included in the latest patch that you should be using instead of the older patch featured in the original article below. You'll find the newer article that features an even easier update method here:
Article below as it originally appeared.
VMware ESXi 6.5 Release Notes ESXi 6.5 | 15 NOV 2016 | ISO Build 4564106
Warning - vCenter/VCSA 6.x should be upgraded to 6.5 beforeupgrading your host(s) to ESXi 6.5!
All the background story on how this easy ESXCLI upgrade method came about was covered in my earlier article:
- How to easily update your VMware Hypervisor to ESXi 6.0 Update 2
Mar 16 2016
Benefits
- No new license needed to go from 6.0.x to 6.5!
- Users of the free hypervisor and folks who can't download the GA Offline bundle now have a path forward as well!
Prerequisites
Once you've completed ALL of the following preparation steps:
- upgraded to VCSA 6.5
- ensured your ESXi 6.0.x host has a working internet connection
- reviewed the release notes
- reviewed How to easily update your VMware Hypervisor to ESXi 6.0 Update 2 for the full back story that includes some warnings about potential gotchas/driver issues
- backed up the ESXi 6.0 you've already got, using something like one of the home-lab-friendly techniques such as using USB Image Tools, as detailed by Florian Grehl here
you can now safely continue with this one-liner approach to upgrading your lab environment.
Unsupported, at your own risk, see the full disclaimer at below left.
I personally tested upgrading from 6.0U2 to 6.5 my first time with the GA code in the live and (obviously) unrehearsed video below.
What's nice about this ESXCLI upgrade method is that its super simple and convenient, and you don't have to worry about logging in to My VMware and downloading your ESXi 6.5 ISO:
Name: VMware-VMvisor-Installer-6.5.0-4564106.x86_64.iso
Release Date: 2016-11-15
Build Number: 4564106
Upgrade
Download and upgrade to 6.5 using the patch directly from the VMware Online Depot, entire process including reboot is usually well under 15 minutes
- Open an SSH session (eg. PuTTY) to your ESXi 6.0.x server
(if you forgot to enable SSH, here's how) - Turn on maintenance mode, or ensure you've set your ESXi host to automatically gracefully shutdown all VMs upon host reboot, or shutdown all the VMs gracefully that you care about, including VCSA.
- Paste the line below into into your SSH session, then hit enter, waiting somewhere around 3 to 10 minutes for it to finish up, depending mostly on the the speed of the ESXi's connection to the internet, and a little on the speed of the storage media that ESXi is installed on:
- Optional - Depending upon your ESXi firewall configuration, if the above command results in a network related error, the first fix to try is this command:
then repeat step 3 above. More details about the firewall here, including a way to return to your prior state.
- If you turned on maintenance mode earlier, remember to turn maintenance mode off.
- Type reboot and hit return (to restart your ESXi server), or use your favorite ESXi UI to restart the host.
- After the reboot is done, it would be a good idea to test login using ESXi host client, pointing your browser to the IP or hostname of your just-graded server, to be sure everthing seems to be working right.
You're done!
Special thanks to VMware ESXi Patch Tracker by Andreas Peetz at the VMware Front Experience Blog.
That's it! When the reboot is complete, you'll see for yourself that you now have the latest ESXi, Build 4564106, as pictured above. Now you have more spare time to read more TinkerTry articles!
By the way, you could use VMware Update Manager on a Windows system or VM, but for one-off upgrades typical in a small home lab, pasting these 1 or 2 lines of code is pretty darn easy.
Looking ahead, since VUM is now built into VCSA 6.5, this will add another way to do future upgrades and patches, even in a small home lab environment.
Potential SATA and Realtek NIC gotchas
If you find some of your SATA/AHCI datastores disappear from view after this upgrade, worry not, the VMFS datastores are still there, you just can't see them. This article should still save you:
- For ESXi 6.0, those ESXi 5.1 VIBs for ASMedia SATA ports and Realtek NICs still seem to be working (but unsupported)
Mar 04 2015
Video
Original article snippet, as originally published on Nov 20 2016, appears as it was, below.
Coming soon
It's here, see above!The TinkerTry'd easy-upgrade method just isn't ready yet, see why at VMware Front Experience Blog's
- VMware ESXi Patch Tracker
The ESXi 6.5.0 GA Imageprofile is not yet available in the VMware Online Depot. Subscribe here now to get notified at release time!
If VMware does decide to make ESXi 6.5 available up there in this same cloudy depot, it's likely you'll be using this simple one-liner, to get the job done:
but currently, it errors out with this message:
How about querying what bundles are available, just in case I got the bundle name wrong? See what pcrandom suggests:
Nope, no 6.5 versions listed there, at all. You can try for yourself, as this is just a harmless list command.
What to do? How to upgrade to 6.5 right now? No problem, just read this article for the somewhat more involved ISO download/mount method:
- How to Upgrade ESXi 6.0 to 6.5 via ISO
Nov 20 2016 by Vladan Seget at vladan.fr
Nov 24 2016 Update
The correct file now showed up on VMware's Respository, as seen in VMware ESXi Patch Tracker, which allowed me to get this all working, and make the edits to the article above.
See also at TinkerTry
How to easily update your VMware vCenter Server Appliance to VCSA 6.5
Nov 20 2016Mar 14 2016
VMware ESXi 6.5 first look at install/config featuring vSphere Host Client HTML5 Web UI
Nov 15 2016In VMware vSphere 6.5, missing functions in speedy HTML5 Web UI leaves us saddled with vSphere Web Client (Flash), C# Client still connects to hosts, but not to vSphere
Nov 16 2016
See also
ESXi 6.5 Release Notes for free license and white box users
Nov 24 2016 by Andreas Peetz at VMware Front ExperienceVMware ESXi Patch Tracker
Nov 24 2016 by Andreas Peetz at VMware Front Experience- VMware vSphere 6.5 Documentation Center - Upgrade or Update a Host with Image Profiles
VMware