Reference Guide

Bulletin

Storage Spaces Direct Ready Nodes Upgrade

Guidance from Windows Server 2016 to 2019

For Dell EMC customers who are interested in upgrading their S2D Ready Nodes from Windows

Server 2016 datacenter edition to 2019 datacenter edition and looking for assistance, Dell EMC is

proud to offer the industry’s first tested, validated, and globally available Upgrade Service. This

service will be a custom offering as there are many variable details which must be considered

when planning and executing a successful upgrade.

The Upgrade will be performed by the same group of project management and technical experts

who deploy new Ready Solutions globally. Starting from the initial inquiry for a quote, you will

receive extensive planning and coordination help with the upgrade. During the implementation

phase, your ProDeploy engineer meticulously performs the detailed steps to successfully bring

your cluster through the upgrade process to Windows Server 2019. The Dell EMC ProDeploy and

ProSupport teams are world class Microsoft technology professionals with remarkable depth and

breadth of expertise and global reach.

Please reach out to a Dell EMC sales rep for more details on this offering.

Dell EMC strongly discourages customers or partners attempting to upgrade clusters

themselves. Dell EMC has thoroughly tested the upgrade process and has identified many steps

which must be followed precisely for a successful upgrade.

For Dell EMC customers who are interested in upgrading from Windows Server 2016 to 2019

themselves without Dell EMC Services, Dell EMC strongly recommends the use of rolling

upgrade approach only by following the “Clean-OS install while VMs are running or stopped”

guidance published by Microsoft below:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/storage/storage-spaces/upgrade-storage-

spaces-direct-to-windows-server-2019

Note: In-place upgrade method is not recommended at this time as it has not been fully validated

by Dell EMC and could potentially lead to unforeseen issues that could be difficult to troubleshoot.

Please be aware that Dell EMC ProSupport entitlement for S2D Solutions does not cover any

issues that may arise during upgrades performed by customer/third party vendors. For more

details on the ProSupport for S2D service description, please see the link below:

https://i.dell.com/sites/doccontent/legal/service-descriptions/en/Documents/dell-emc-prosupport-

for-software-for-storage-spaces-direct-ready-nodes-supplement-sd-EN.pdf