There is sometimes confusion over upgrades, if you can just upgrade to the next version, or if there is an CU (Cumulative Update) or UR (Update Rollup) minimum level that is required BEFORE a major version upgrade.
The MAJOR VERSION upgrade path is below, which Marnix talked about HERE.
SCOM 2007R2> SCOM 2012 RTM> SCOM 2012 SP1> SCOM 2012 R2
No shortcuts… you have to upgrade to each major version before continuing to the next. So if you are way behind, considering a side-by-side migration can be MUCH less work. Depends on where you are at.
Ok, back to the Update Rollup requirements. Technically speaking, only the upgrade from SCOM 2007 R2 > SCOM 2012 RTM has a documented CU level. Per http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh476934.aspx which states the following:
Upgrading to System Center 2012 – Operations Manager is supported from Operations Manager 2007 R2 CU4, or from the latest available CU.
Which basically means if you are at CU4 or later on SCOM 2007R2, you can upgrade to SCOM 2012 RTM. There are no other statements in TechNet which state that any of the SCOM 2012 SP1 or R2 upgrades have a minimum UR requirement. Therefore, our supported upgrade path looks like:
SCOM 2007R2 CU4+> SCOM 2012 RTM> SCOM 2012 SP1> SCOM 2012 R2
If I were performing a rolling upgrade, this is most likely how I’d recommend doing it. If you are planning a VERY SLOW migration from one version to another, due to lots of additional work that is necessary, such as upgrading OS’s or SQL versions along the way, then you might consider going ahead and applying whatever the most recent Update Rollup available for SCOM 2012. There are documented here:
One word of caution. The latest word from the product group just came out, on supported interop scenarios:
They specifically called out one little point:
*Latest CU or UR applies in all cases
This most likely means, this is what they tested, at the time of this posting. I cant say this is a “requirement”. If you are doing a rolling upgrade, applying the latest UR to SCOM 2012 RTM before upgrading to SCOM 2012 SP1, then applying the latest UR to SCOM 2012 SP1 before upgrading to SCOM 2012 R2, would be a lot of extra effort, and technically is not a requirement to make the upgrade. The best decision would be to figure out how long you plan to stay at each stage, how large your management group is, and how much effort it would be in order to deploy the latest UR in each case.
The upgrade from 2007R2 CU4+ to SCOM 2012 RTM is the biggest jump, because you must update ALL your agents to SCOM 2012 before finalizing the upgrade. After that, you can technically leave your agents alone, since a SCOM 2012RTM agent can report to both SCOM 2012 SP1 and R2 management servers. Then just update your agents at the end, to SCOM 2012 R2 (plus whatever the latest UR is at that time).
Resource links:
SCOM 2007R2 > SCOM 2012 RTM Upgrade Guide TechNet
There are a TON of really good blogs out there with upgrade experiences, tips and tricks, so I cant possibly list them all. I did want to point out a really cool link from a colleague, Wei H Lim, who wrote an updated version of the “Upgrade Helper” MP but for moving from SCOM 2012 SP1 > SCOM 2012 R2. He does some amazing work so if you don’t follow his blog definitely add him to your lists.
OpsMgr- Sample Upgrade Helper MP for 2012 SP1 to 2012 R2 (SUHMP2012R2)