The installation of vCenter 5.5 on a Windows machine is done using the installer available on the vCenter Installation DVD. The installer can be initiated separately or run as part of the simple installation process.
In this chapter, we will be using the simple installer to perform a new installation of vCenter Server.
Let's take a look at the pre-install checks that need to be performed:
Check the vCenter Server software requirements.
Check ESXi compatibility.
Check database compatibility.
Take a snapshot of your vCenter VM so that you can revert to a clean VM in the event of the install failing.
We won't be discussing these checks here, as these were discussed in the Performing an upgrade of vCenter Server section in Chapter 1, Upgrading to vSphere 5.5.
You can download the vCenter Server installation bundle from VMware's product downloads page. For instructions on how to get there, read the Downloading vCenter 5.5 section in Chapter 1, Upgrading to vSphere...