I use this method and it works very well.
How To Backup & Restore Free ESXi Host Configuration
Posted on 02/15/2013 by William Lam
ESXi host configurations can easily be backed up and restored using either the vCLI's vicfg-cfgbackup or PowerCLI's Get-VMHostFirmware cmdlet. These commands along with others that perform "write" operations are only supported when you have a (paid) licensed version of ESXi. If you are using free ESXi, the remote commands are only available for "read-only" operations. For more details, please refer to this article here.
Note: In my personal opinion, it is much quicker and more efficient to re-install ESXi and apply your configurations using either a scripted deployment such as kickstart or a combination along with post configuration scripts. Re-installs become extremely trivial when you centralize your ESXi host configurations, even for small setups.
Having said that, if you are running free ESXi in a small shop or in a home lab and wish to backup your ESXi host configurations, you can still do so by leveraging a neat little tool called vim-cmd found within the ESXi Shell. There is a section under hostsvc/firmware which manages the ESXi host configuration which also uses the same vSphere APIs that both vicfg-cfgbackup & Get-VMHostFirmeware command uses.
Under this section of vim-cmd, there are four commands:
1. backup_config
2. reset_config
3. restore_config
4. sync_config
Prior to actually backing up your ESXi host configuration, run the following command which will flush the ESXi configuration changes:
vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/sync_config
To backup the ESXi host configurations, run the following command which will generate a file that will be automatically stored in /scratch/downloads and can also be downloaded from a web browser using the URL shown from the output:
vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/backup_config
Before restoring your ESXi host configurations, you will need to ensure the file is renamed to configBundle.tgz and stored under /tmp directory. You will also need to ensure the ESXi host is placed in maintenance mode by running the following command:
vim-cmd hostsvc/maintenance_mode_enter
To restore the ESXi host configurations, run the following command and specify the backup configuration file which should reside in /tmp/configBundle.tgz:
vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/restore_config /tmp/configBundle.tgz
Note: Upon completing the restore, it will automatically reboot your ESXi host.
Here is a screenshot using the above commands to backup and then restore ESXi host:
Good luck.
