Set Up the Target vCenter Server Appliance

When the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the migration process to transfer the data from the source vCenter Server and start the services of the newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance.

The period of time during which your system is unavailable does not begin until you start to set up the target appliance. You cannot cancel or interrupt the process until it finishes with the shutdown of the source deployment. The time your system is unavailable ends when the target appliance starts.

Procedure

1. Review the introduction to stage 2 of the migration process and click Next.
2. On the Select source vCenter Server page, enter the vCenter Single Sign-On administrator password and the root password of the source vCenter Server, enter the password of the user with administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, and click Next.
3. (Optional) Accept the warning message, if any, by clicking Yes.
4. If your source Windows machine is connected to an Active Directory domain, enter the credentials for an administrator domain user with permission to add the target machine to the Active Directory domain, and click Next.
   Note: The installer verifies the entered credentials, but does not check the required privileges to add the target machine to the Active Directory domain. Verify that the user credentials have all the required permissions to add a machine to the Active Directory domain.
5. Specify the replication topology for the vCenter Server. When converging vCenter Server instance with an external Platform Services Controller you must specify the replication topology.

   Convergence is the process of converting a vCenter Server instance with an external Platform Services Controller to a vCenter Server instance with those services embedded in the appliance.

   • This is the first vCenter Server in the topology that I want to converge.
   • This is a subsequent vCenter Server.

     If this is a subsequent vCenter Server, provide the IP address of its partner vCenter Server and its HTTPS port.

6. On the Select migration data page, choose the types of data that you want to transfer from the source vCenter Server to the target appliance.
   The large amount of data requires more time to be transferred to the new appliance.
7. On the ready to complete page, review the migration settings, accept the backup acknowledgment, and click Finish.
8. Click OK to confirm the shutdown of the source vCenter Server.
9. Wait for the data transfer and setup process to finish. Click OK to go to the vCenter Server Getting Started page.

Results

vCenter Server is migrated from Windows to a newly deployed target vCenter Server appliance. The source vCenter Server is powered off and the target appliance starts.

What to do next

• Verify Your vCenter Server Upgrade or Migration Is Successful.
• Upgrade all vCenter Server instances in the vCenter Single Sign-On domain.
• After converging a vCenter Server with an external Platform Services Controller node to a vCenter Server appliance, you must decommission the original external Platform Services Controller. Decommissioning a Platform Services Controller shuts it down and removes it from the single sign-on domain. See Decommission the Platform Services Controller.
• For post-migration steps, see After Upgrading or Migrating vCenter Server.

• You can configure high availability for the vCenter Server appliance. For information about providing vCenter Server appliance high availability, see vSphere Availability.