Distributed vCenter Server 5.5 for Windows Services Relocation During Upgrade or Migration

Custom installations of vCenter Server 5.5 for Windows that have services located across multiple machines are upgraded and relocated (if required) to the vCenter Server system during the upgrade or migration process.

If all vCenter Server 5.5 services are deployed in the same system, they are upgraded in place without any need for configuration after upgrade. However, if you have one or more services deployed remotely, the upgrade and migration software relocates your service or services to the vCenter Server virtual machine or physical server during upgrade or migration. Some services require reconfiguration or other actions after upgrade or migration. These vCenter Server 5.5 for Windows services are relocated to become part of the vCenter Server group of services during the upgrade or migration process:

• vSphere Web Client
• vSphere Auto Deploy
• vSphere Syslog Collector
• vSphere ESXi Dump Collector
• vSphere Update Manager

vCenter Inventory Services functionality is replaced by the vCenter Content Library and other services which are part of vCenter Server 6.5. The upgrade or migration process migrates the data from vCenter Inventory Service to the new database support services in vCenter Server 6.5.

vSphere Syslog Collector functionality is replaced by vCenter Server services functionality.

vCenter Server and vCenter Single Sign-On are the only services that are not relocated. vCenter Single Sign-On instances are upgraded in place to become part of an external Platform Services Controller instance if they are deployed on a system other than the system where the vCenter Server resides.

Table 1. vCenter Server 5.5 Distributed Service Relocation During Upgrade

Service Name	Service Location Before Upgrade	Service Location After Upgrade	Post-Upgrade Actions
vCenter Inventory Service	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Replaced with vCenter Content Library as part of the vCenter Server services	vCenter Inventory Service 5.5 data is copied to the vCenter Content Library instance that is installed with vCenter Server 6.5. You do not need to copy it manually. vCenter Inventory Service 5.5 is still running but no longer used. It must be manually stopped and removed.
vSphere Web Client	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Installed as part of the vCenter Server services	vCenter Server 5.5 data is copied to the vSphere Web Client 6.5 instance that is installed with vCenter Server 6.5. vSphere Web Client 5.5 is still running but is no longer used. It must be manually stopped and removed.
vSphere Auto Deploy	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Relocated as part of the vCenter Server system	vSphere Auto Deploy data is copied to the Auto Deploy 6.5 instance that is installed with vCenter Server 6.5. Repoint vCenter Server DHCP settings to the migrated vSphere Auto Deploy service. vCenter Server vSphere Auto Deploy 5.5 is still running but is no longer used. It must be manually stopped and removed.
vSphere Syslog Collector	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Relocated as part of the vCenter Server services Data is not retained. Configurations for ports, protocols, and rotation log size are preserved.	ESXi system information might remain on an old system until you relocate it. ESXi hosts might require reconfiguration to point to the new vSphere Syslog Collector server.
vSphere ESXi Dump Collector	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Installed as part of the vCenter Server services Data is not retained.	ESXi core dump data might remain on an older system until you migrate it. ESXi hosts might require reconfiguration to point to the new vSphere ESXI Dump server.
vSphere Update Manager	Not installed on the vCenter Server system	Relocated as part of the vCenter Server system or the vCenter Server Appliance	Run Migration Assistant on the source Update Manager machine, if Update Manager is installed on an different machine from vCenter Server.

For more information about upgrade scenarios, see Example Upgrade Paths for vCenter Server version 5.5 to version 6.5.

For more information about migration scenarios, see Example Migration Paths from vCenter Server for Windows to vCenter Server Appliance 6.5.

When migrating vCenter Server instances to vCenter Server Appliance instances, some services do not behave the same way for vCenter Server for Windows and vCenter Server Appliance. For details on services that differ between vCenter Server for Windows and vCenter Server Appliance, see Differences between Upgrading and Migrating vCenter Server on Windows.