vCenter 5.0 decommission checklist (windows)

Here's a small checklist I do when decommissioning Windows based vCenters where we have already moved all hosts out. 5.0 is super easy in this sense since the roles aren't distributed. This assumes the server will be decommissioned and was dedicated to just vCenter.

1. Remove all licenses that were already migrated (you can't remove the last vCenter license)
2. Rename the vDC explaining where the hosts are now and let it sit there for a while so admins that may log in get it (there should have been proper emails and stuff through other channels about the change)
3. Confirm where VUM (upgrade manager) is installed in the VUM config
4. Check the Add/Remove programs for installed programs
5. Run odbcad32.exe to check the DB server for vCenter (in the System DSN)
6. Where VUM is installed in the same server, which you may have confirmed from the installed programs list, use c:\Windows\SysWOW64\odbcad32.exe to check the 32-bit System DSN and DB server details
7. Uninstall VMware add-on programs that will need vCenter access to remove their plugins
8. Uninstall additional software like PowerCLI, Converter, etc
9. Uninstall vCenter (which uninstalls orchestrator).
10. Uninstall the vSphere client
11. Uninstall the embedded or standard SQL server (you really want to make sure the database server wasn't used for anything else!). If the DB is in a remote location, work with your DBAs to archive/decommission the database
12. Update your documentation, CMDB details, etc

Now take care of OS decommissioning tasks