@JedB,
Please note this message you saw in your test when you deactivated HA explicitly is a strong indicator of what happens when HA is disabled. If HA is disabled, vLCM (or the underlying update process) might interpret this as an intention to remove the HA functionality from the host, leading to the uninstallation of its components. This is not the desired behavior if you intend to keep HA active.
* Minimizing Downtime and Risk: Leaving HA enabled allows vLCM to leverage its capabilities for a rolling update. In a 2-node cluster, this means one host is updated at a time, ensuring that your VMs remain running on the other host. If you manually disable HA, you increase the risk of downtime during the update process, as there's no automatic failover mechanism if something goes wrong.
Hence, for image-based updates in a 2-node cluster:
* Ensure HA is enabled and configured correctly before starting the update.
* Use vLCM to perform the compliance check and remediation.
* vLCM will handle putting hosts into maintenance mode and bringing them out, coordinating with HA to ensure minimal disruption.
By trusting vLCM and HA to work together, you'll have a more robust and less error-prone update process.
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Thank you!
Regards,
Shen
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Original Message:
Sent: Jul 02, 2025 08:18 AM
From: JedB
Subject: How to: 2-node image based ESXi update
Hi!
I am currently switching to the image-based update and am wondering whether I should also deactivate the HA for updates in a 2-node cluster (no vSAN) as before.
In a test I have seen that if I deactivate it and then run the compliance check for the update, the HA component seems to be uninstalled. Message: Solution Components of disabled Solutions vSphere HA 8.0 U3 will be removed from this host during remediation.
So is it better to leave HA activated and will vLCM then take care of it?