To ensure the successful migration of vCenter Server, you must perform a set of required tasks and pre-checks prior to running the migration.

General Prerequisites

Target System Prerequisites

  • Verify that your system meets the minimum software and hardware requirements. See System Requirements for the New vCenter Server Appliance.
  • If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
  • If you plan to deploy the new appliance on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is not part of a fully automated DRS cluster.
  • If you plan to deploy the new appliance on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server instance, verify that the cluster contains at least one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
  • If you plan to deploy the new appliance on a DRS cluster of the inventory of a vCenter Server instance, verify that the cluster is not fully automated.

Source System Prerequisites

  • Verify that the source machine that you want to migrate does not run on an ESXi host that is part of a fully automated DRS cluster.
  • Verify that you have sufficient disk space on the source machine that you want to migrate so that you can accommodate the data for the migration.
  • Create an image-based backup of the vCenter Server appliance you are migrating as a precaution in case there is a failure during the migration process. If you are migrating a vCenter Server appliance with an external Platform Services Controller, take a image-based backup of the Platform Services Controller appliance as well.
    Important: To take a pre-migration image-based backup, power off all the vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller nodes in your environment, and take a backup of each node. After you have taken backups of all the nodes, you can restart them and proceed with the migration procedure.

    If the migration fails, delete the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance, and restore the vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller nodes from their respective backups. You must restore all the nodes in the environment from their backups. Failing to do so will cause the replication partners to be out of synchronization with the restored node.

    To learn about image-based back, see "Image-Based Backup and Restore of a vCenter Server Environment" in vCenter Server Installation and Setup.

  • If you use an external database, back up the external database.

Network Prerequisites

  • If you plan to assign a static IP address in the temporary network settings of the appliance, verify that you have configured the forward and reverse DNS records for the IP address.
  • If you plan to assign a DHCP IP address in the temporary network settings of the new appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new appliance is in the same network as the ESXi host on which the existing vCenter Server appliance runs.
  • If you plan to assign a DHCP IP address in the temporary network settings of the new appliance, verify that the ESXi host on which you want to deploy the new appliance is connected to at least one network that is associated with a port group which accepts MAC address changes. Note that the default security policy of a distributed virtual switch is to reject MAC address changes. For information about how to configure the security policy for a switch or port group, see vSphere Networking.
  • Add the source vCenter Server IP address in the DNS records.