I would recommend for sure to use the VMware vSphere Update Manager.

This is really the best way to go.

Yes and no :)

If VMware has released a newer driver for the hardware from their repository you will get it.

However any Dell released patches will most likely not be downloaded automatic, however you could add the Dell repository to your Update Manager.

I wrote a blog post that explains how to do that here: www.perfectcloud.org/.../update-manager-vendors-online-depots-available

Hey there Steve

I do not think there is an official Dell way to patch servers.

What i do when i recommend customers on what to do when it comes to patches is to use Update manager. This is vmwares recommended tool to patch esx hosts and you can also use it to update vms and the hardware on vms.

So the answer is yes it is OK to use vmwares patches they wont overwrite the drivers that are specific Dell.

But you also talk about using an iso to patch the hosts this is very timeconsuming compared to use update manager also that is an upgrade not a patch. Look at the build numbers. The first one is the GA release and the other update1 you will get the same patches from update manager. But if there has been any specific changes from Dell in their drivers or in their iso that you wont get through update manager.

If you have a system that needs those changes then an upgrade is better with the iso from Dell. At this date we also got 5.5 released and you have a dell version release as well.

This again would be an upgrade where you have to use the iso or upload the iso to update manager to do the upgrade.

Good luck hopefully this answers some of your questions.

Regards Boris

Sorry for the delayed response.  So when using the Update Manager to install updates will that also update the Dell Drivers on the ESXi host if needed?

But seems only the OpenManage packages are downloaded from the Dell Online Repository,     http://vmwaredepot.dell.com/index.xml

None of the Hardware drivers included in the Dell Customized ESXi installer can be found there. The only way I've found to reliably update those drivers is to boot the Dell Custom install CD and do an update. I don't understand why the Dell ESXi hardware drivers aren't included in the Dell Online Repo.