VMDK files left over from VCB -

[NetZwerg]

Hello,

I recently upgraded our vSphere to 4.1, thus needed to re-install the Virtualcenter VM completely - now that's everything moved I found the following in the old VirtualCenter's directory: lots of .vmdk files from failed or interrupted VCB Sessions.

These files seemed to get added to the VCB Proxy in hot-add mode, but sometimes didn't get deleted.

filesize of the vmdks is 1MB, some are 64KB - Provisioned size is always identical to the source VM the .vmdk belonged to.

Can I safely delete those files? As I don't know how VMFS works, I rather ask first

[jamesbowling]

First, so you have a bunch of -0000.vmdk files sitting around? If so, make sure that they are not attached to anything. If they are then we need to look into the CID and ParentCID information for each file so we can trace it back and see if we would need to clone the VMDK with vmkfstools. If they are not attached to anything I would say do the following:

1. Create a folder in the VM's folder called old_vmdk

2. Move those VMDKs into that folder.

3. Verify everything is running properly.

4. Go and delete the files and remove the folder that was created.

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[NetZwerg]

First, so you have a bunch of -0000.vmdk files sitting around?

that's right

If so, make sure that they are not attached to anything.

Hmm... how do I know if a free flying .vmdk is attached to anything? (There's no .lck files like on WS)

[jamesbowling · Accepted solution]

One easy way to see is to look if you have any snapshots running on the VM. That is normally where you would see these.

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[NetZwerg]

well there is not a single snapshot on the datastore. And the old Vcenter is already deleted as well.

So I consider those files totally orphaned and will delete them (once I catch a moment when a fresh backup is finished