Process of Upgrading/Restoring v. 8.3 to v 9.2

[shirishn]

Hello,

I have been searching long long for the below issue.

I have a server with plesk with over 650 Domains and 145 clients etc.. with lot of dns settings (Customized).
I call it Source SERVER .. IT IS IN PLESK 8.3.0

NOw, The RAM is limited, processor avg use is now 90% everytime.

So, i purchased a new server , IT Came with PLESK 9.2.0 , i call it DESTINATION SERVER

Now, i took the backup using GUI of all clients everything including skinns etc.. all and it created over 42 GB of Single " SOURCE.PSA " file.

I transferred it to Destination server.. (lot of time involved).
Tried restoring.. its giving various errors.. not a valid file etc.

then i bingg'd it and found that there is pre9-convert-backup utility to convert the backup to 9 version.
I used it. and it made a folder with several folder files etc.. with converted-info.xml,
i copied everything of that in the DESTINATION server backup folder.
then in the plesk restore, i was able to see the message the backup size 42 GB, invalid backup file.

i am stuck.

Now , i contacted my Server provider explaning this all,

he suggested me to Upgrade my SOURCE server itself to :
1. Version 8.6
then
2. 8.6 -> Version 9.2

then Make a backup file again, transport it to DESTINATIOn. and try restoring.

Its sounds ok to me.

But the problem is ,
a) what if upgradation of v.8.3 to 8.6 fails ?
b) what if upgradation of v.8.6 to 9.2 fails ?
c) even if all worked is it sure that the backup created after will be restorable in the new machine with diffrent ip and hardware.


Guru's , Kindly guide me, if you have done similar jobs.

thanks
for reading this much..