Install vCenter Orchestrator on a Dedicated Server

Article by Michael Poore (@mpoore)

The binaries for vCenter Orchestrator (vCO) come bundled alongside vCenter Server and are installed by default when vCenter is installed. But what if, and it's probably a better practice, you want to install vCO on a separate server to vCenter. How's that done?

Before running through that, first let's cover requirements. vCO server components must be installed on a 64-bit Windows OS. The client component can happily sit on 32-bit. The minimum recommended RAM is 4GB but in a lab or non-production environment you can get away with less depending on if the database is co-located or not.

I ran the vCO install on single CPU, 2GB RAM Windows 2008 R2 VM with the database component located on another server. No problem.

The first step is mounting the vCenter Server 5.0 install ISO and closing the autorun program if it starts as it's not needed for this. Next open Windows Explorer and navigate to the CD / DVD drive.

Drill down into “vCenter-Server” and then “vCO”. There you find an install file called “vCenterOrchestrator” which needs to be run.

Introduction, click “Next”.

Accept the License Agreement and click “Next”.

Accept the default install folder and click “Next”.

Choosing the Install Set. “Client – Server” is selected by default and installs both the server components of vCO and the client program. For your first run through you might as well just click “Next”.

Where to place program shortcuts? The VMware Program Group exists already because, as I said earlier, the install is on a VM and the VMtools are already installed. Click “Next”.

There's a summary. Just click “Install”.

vCO is installed, click “Done” to close the installer.

What's interesting is that unlike vCO's default installation on the vCenter Server the “VMware vCenter Orchestrator Configuration” service is automatically started.

From this point onwards configuration of vCO is almost identical to the processes followed when vCO is on the vCenter Server.