Do we have to install App Fabric/Distributed Cache CU update in all servers in Farm?

Question

I am thinking of patching App Fabric/Distributed Cache service in SharePoint 2013 farm. I have 1 WFE and 1 App Server and I only have one host in my cache cluster that is in WFE. Now while applying CU update do I have to run executable in both servers or the server where cache host is running.

Thank You

Answer 1

AppFabric CU(latest is CU5) is basically for windows server. So this should apply to all server in the farm irrespective those server are part of Cache cluster or not. It is normally good practice that all server should be on the same patch level.

The process here is that you need to patch one machine at a time according to these steps:

1. Shut down the service instance on one machine
2. Patch AppFabric 1.1
3. Post-patch operations
4. Start the service instance
5. Restart from 1 on the next machine

Do not do servers in parallel unless you have a massive amount of servers and can handle that extra load/redundancy!

How to patch the Distributed Cache in SharePoint 2013

Update to Guidance for Patching AppFabric on SharePoint 2013 Distributed Cache Servers