SAP Hardware migration and ECC upgrade

[Former Member]

Hi,

We have to perform the following tasks :

1. Migrate hardware for application server to a virtualized platform (vmware).
2. Upgrade database to oracle 10 to 11g in a RAC environment also will be migrating current hardware
3. Upgrade ECC 6 from EHP3 to EHP6

We can combine task 1 and 2 by doing a homogeneous system copy with export/import  method.

I am interested in finding out whether we can combine the task 3 along with task 1 &2.

Our environment has a distributed installtion with ECC 6.0, OS - red hat linux 5.8 and DB - oracle 10.2.0.4

Would like to know if this i possible or if it too challenging.

Thanks

LM

[Former Member]

Hi LM,

    You have to perform the following that makes your job pretty easier.

1. Take an export of your source system.

2.Install Oracle  11 in your target system and import the data in your target system.

3.Later do the upgrade to EHP6 from EHP3 in the target system.

Reasons for me to suggest this stragety is that we will have a backup of your old system in case of any migration or upgrade failure.Secondly, anyways you will have to perform export and import method for the hardware migration hence you can have the latest DB with patches so that you MIGHT not face  any error  during this upgrade activity.

I hope this information helps.

Thanks and Regards,

Vimal

[Former Member]

Hi Vimal, thanks for your response and suggestions.

This is pretty much my approach and since we have the current system intact even after the migration, we can always switch back if we face any issues with the migration.

My concern is reagrding the downtime needed for EHP upgrade. If i was to combine task 3 along with task 1& 2, my downtime would be quite big. Export /Import process is quite time consuming and plus the EHP upgrade is not an option i suppose.

Would there be a better way to combine all  3 tasks ? with minimal downtime ?

For us 16 to 20 hrs is  an acceptable downtime

Thanks

[Former Member]

Hi,

It is not possible combine all the three steps .

What is your DB size? If the DB size is more than 1 TB, then you have to do mulitple test migration to reduce the export and import time and then do the upgrade.

Try to do a test migration and upgrade and see how long the activities goes...See in what ways you can reduce the downtime....

You have to either upgrade and migrate or migrate and export... You can't do the three things in single ways.

Thanks and Regards,

Vimal

[Former Member]

My DB size is roughly 700 GB. So i think i will stick to my initial plan of migrate and then upgrade as a different task.

Thanks for suggestions.