Firmware Upgrade Path

Hi , apparently i need to upgrade the firmware on my production storage environment to 7.x 

the upgrade path matrix says 5.2.5 can go up to 6.05 , then from 6.05 i can go to 7.x

the EQL firmware upgrade adviser tool says recommended 6.0.11 

so conflicting information here 

can i go directly from 5.2.5 to 6.0.11 ?  or should i follow the upgrade path document if im actually looking at the most current document i came across a lot of them

also any recommendations would be helpful on  should i take the hosts offline before  the upgrade ? with the current running firmware " read a couple of KBs and some awesome experiences about vmfs may get corrupt in a way or another with any firmware version below 6.06-H2. after doing firmware upgrade

thanks