How to easily update your VMware vCenter Server Appliance from VCSA 6.5 to 6.5.0a

Posted by Paul Braren on Feb 7 2017 (updated on Mar 31 2018) in

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 here:

How to easily update your VMware vCenter Server Appliance from 6.5.x to 6.5 Update 1g (VCSA 6.5 U1g) with Spectre mitigation

Article below as it originally appeared.

VMware Release Notes for vCenter Server Appliance 6.5.0a | 02 FEB 2017 | Build 4944578

Warning:
vCenter/VCSA 6.5 should be upgraded to 6.5.0a before upgrading your host(s) to ESXi 6.5.0a!

Once in a while, things are easy. One of the selling points of making the big move from vCenter+Windows to VCSA has been the ease of VCSA upgrades through the handy VAMI web UI. Yep, works as advertised! This is a very easy upgrade, as shown screen-by-screen below.

Prerequisite

VCSA 6.5 with internet access

If your VCSA has no internet access, follow the offline install procedure at:

Patch for VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.5.0a (2148330)

Preparations

Here's my bubble caption at the beginning of the short and simple walk-thru video below:

Do this VCSA 6.5.0a upgrade in a test environment first! Before attempting, you should be sure to have a full backup, such as the simple native VCSA backup button seen at top-right. You can also use a 3rd party backup solution. At a minimum, you can do a snapshot of this VCSA VM before upgrading, make sure everything works alright, then remove the snapshot, ideally within a day or so, to avoid performance degradation