Nerdy Drunk

I have done manual updates for quite a long time, but I would suggest looking at VMware Update Manage for simplifying your updates. With any reboot of a host I would suggest performing a host configuration backup before rebooting. I do the following actions for each host when updating. I have found obtaining a host configuration backup before a reboot can be very important for a small environment.

• Put the host into maintenance mode.
• Perform a host configuration backup.
• Update host and reboot. Skip this step if you are going to use update manager.
• Exit the host from maintenance mode.

With any update I always like to verify I have the correct host, and that the host is in maintenance mode.

[root@matx01vmvh01:~] esxcli system maintenanceMode get
Enabled

Normally I use the vib update option for updating hosts.

esxcli software vib update --depot=/vmfs/volumes/datastore1/ESXi500-201112001.zip
esxcli system shutdown reboot -d 10 -r now

But when attempting to update to ESXi 6.0 Update 2 I found that I had to use the profile update option instead due to a dependency requirement. I have previously used this way of updating to update via web download, but it can also be used with a local file.

[root@matx01vmvh01:~] esxcli software sources profile list -d /vmfs/volumes/DS-QN01VMWR/ISOs/update-from-esxi6.0-6.0_update02.zip
Name                              Vendor        Acceptance Level
--------------------------------  ------------  ----------------
ESXi-6.0.0-20160301001s-no-tools  VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
ESXi-6.0.0-20160302001-standard   VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
ESXi-6.0.0-20160301001s-standard  VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
ESXi-6.0.0-20160302001-no-tools   VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
[root@matx01vmvh01:~] esxcli software profile update -d /vmfs/volumes/DS-QN01VMWR/ISOs/update-from-esxi6.0-6.0_update02.zip -p ESXi-6.0.0-20160302001-standard

Here is how you can use esxcli to update ESXi via web download.

~ # esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r httpClient
~ # esxcli software sources profile list -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml | grep -i esxi-5.5.0-2015 | grep -i standard
ESXi-5.5.0-20150204001-standard   VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
ESXi-5.5.0-20150104001-standard   VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
ESXi-5.5.0-20150101001s-standard  VMware, Inc.  PartnerSupported
~ # esxcli software profile update -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml -p ESXi-5.5.0-20150104001-standard

The following two sites were very helpful in being able to upgrade to ESXi 6.0 Update 2

http://www.gabesvirtualworld.com/vib-requires-vsan-6-0-0-2-34-but-the-requirement-cannot-be-satisfied-within-the-imageprofile/

https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2144595