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VMware: Upgrade ESXi 4.0 to 4.1

Originally published Last updated 4 comments

I run several VMware ESXi 4.0 servers and wanted to upgrade them to ESXi 4.1. The following steps took me less than five minutes. Install the vSphere CLI and download the upgrade package before starting.

Upgrade to ESXi 4.1

  1. Install vSphere Command-Line Interface
    http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/vcli/
  2. Download the ESXi 4.1 (upgrade ZIP from ESXi 4.0) upgrade package
    https://www.vmware.com/tryvmware/p/activate.php?p=free-esxi&lp=1
  3. Store the ZIP on a local drive, such as c:\vmware. Start the vSphere CLI and run the following command:
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    perl vihostupdate.pl --server 192.168.200.1 --username root --password password  --install --bundle c:\vmware\upgrade-from-ESXi4.0-to-4.1.0-0.0.260247-release.zip
  4. Restart the ESXi server and verify that the upgrade to ESXi 4.1 completed as expected.

Upgrade demonstration

In this demo, I will upgrade my VMware ESXi 4.0 server to ESXi 4.1 using the vSphere CLI tools. The server should be up and running in less than five minutes.

Video: YouTube video 3Os2o6hTQyc (the original Flash player no longer works)

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4 comments

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  1. Alex

    I've done it a few weeks ago, with any worries at all.
    There's a similar script for 3.5, for installing it's patches/updating. The process is pretty much the same.

  2. Ivan Versluis

    Thanks Alex for being here. I learned about these scripts not long ago and before that I used the Update utility. For some reason it failed to update my ESXi servers to 4.1 and therefore I learned about these steps.

    I like this much more than having the GUI ;-)

  3. Mike

    Hi. I get the following error when I do this:
    Error: Server version unavailable at 'https://localhost/sdk/vimService.wsdl'
    Please help