Cross posted this to EMC forums but they tend to be a lot less active. Will post a followup here if I find the answer elsewhere first.
I've got a vCenter 5.5 build 1378903 install and a host I just upgraded to 5.5 build 1331820. I did the upgrade by putting it in maintenance mode, detaching my PowerPath/VE 5.8 extension group from the host, attaching my new PowerPath/VE 5.9 group to the host, disabled lockdown, applied all outstanding ESXi 5.1 patches and reboot, applied the PowerPath/VE 5.9 patches and reboot. I used 'rpowermt check_registration' to verify it was okay and it seems to think it is.
However, having not taken it out of maintenance mode yet for fear something is wrong, I checked the EMC VSI tab in my vSphere Client and it reports this at the top of the screen in a bright color:
The PowerPath/VE service is not managing any LUNs on this host.
If I use 'rpowermt host=192.0.2.1 display dev=all' it seems to think things are working:
Pseudo name=emcpower1
VNX ID=1234 [LUN1]
Standard UID=naa.1234 [BLOCK_LUN_20]
state=alive; policy=CLAROpt; queued-IOs=0
Owner: default=SP A, current=SP A Array failover mode: 4
==============================================================================
--------------- Host --------------- - Stor - -- I/O Path -- -- Stats ---
### HW Path I/O Paths Interf. Mode State Q-IOs Errors
==============================================================================
1 vmhba32 C1:T6:L0 SP B4 active alive 0 0
1 vmhba32 C0:T7:L0 SP B5 active alive 0 0
1 vmhba32 C1:T4:L0 SP A4 active alive 0 0
1 vmhba32 C0:T5:L0 SP A5 active alive 0 0
I would assume the output would have been empty if PowerPath was not actually managing I/O to that LUN?
On the Configuration tab, Storage, 'Devices' button, pick one; in the lower window "Device Details" it shows owner as PowerPath.
My other PowerPath/VE 5.8 hosts on the EMC VSI tab continue to state "Found PowerPath/VE version 5.8 (build342) installed on this ESX host..."
I dont want to take it out of maintenance mode and risk live guests moving back to it if something is actually wrong with PowerPath. Anything else I can check?