Updating VMware Tools on a Citrix Provisioning Master Image used to be very time consuming. Nowadays it has gotten a little better, but you still have to do a few extra steps because of the vmxnet3 network adapter. Here are the steps that I took when upgrading to the newest Vmware Tools that came with ESXi 8.0 update.
- Start the Master VM
- Once booted up, add a new E1000E network card
- Check in device manager if the E1000E/Intel network card can be seen
- Shutdown VM
- In the Provisioning console, change the mac address of the target device to that of the E1000E network card
- Disconnect vmxnet3 NIC (uncheck connect on power on)
- Start Master VM. Beware that the E1000E NIC is emulated and is painfully slow. I had instances where it took 15 minutes to boot up!
- Once booted up, start VMware Tools upgrade through Vcenter (interactive)
- Visual C++ Redistributable might be installed, you might need to reboot
- Let boot
- Start Vmware Tools upgrade again (interactive)
- Run the installer
- Shutdown VM
- Disconnect E1000E NIC (uncheck connect on power on)
- Connect vmxnet3 NIC (check connect on power on)
- Boot
- Once booted, fully remove E1000E fully
- In device manager, show hidden devices and delete the greyed out Intel NIC
This time there are no references. I had to try and error myself.
Hi
Agree this is the way to upgrade vmware-tools, easy and simple. BUT, when I spoke to Citrix Support they didn´t say it was a supported way. He still gave me the suggestion to reverse image back to disk, upgrade vmware tools and then create a new vDisk.
really? did they mention the reason?