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TasMot
Contributor
Contributor

ESXi 4.0 - Install to existing machine

Hi,

I have one server box (Dell PE2900) and can't get another (not in the budget). Currently it is running VMWare Server 2.0 under Windows 2008 Standard. I have 8 VMs defined but only run 5 normally. After a lot of reading and studying, I've decided that ESXi 4.0 sounds like a better option, especially since I am getting some weird errors out of Windows which I can't seem to get resolved (the message say a hardware error but Dell says its not). I have check the HCL and all my hardware is compatible.

So, here is the question, I have read some articles which say that the installation of ESXi will format all drives to VMFS at during the install, is this true? Do I need to remove all data from my drives so that it is not lost during the install?

The second question is, if indeed the install does NOT format all the drives, will ESXi be able to access the Windows formatted drives? If ESXi can read the drives (and they do not get formatted during the install), then I have some additional space on the RAID array and can create a Datastore of the same size as one of the drives, copy over and repeat until all of the drives are migrated.

As I mentioned, I have 8 VMs already defined plus lots of other data (about 700 GIG) on my drives and I want to migrate to the ESXi hypervisor but don't want to lose the data in the process.

So, will this work?

Thanks,

Tom

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weinstein5
Immortal
Immortal

Welcome to the Forums - ESXi and ESX install on to bare metal - they are not hosted ontop of an operating system like vmware server is so yes you will have to remove everything off of that box before you install ESXi because ESX does not read NTFS -

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JimKnopf99
Commander
Commander

Hi,

you have to backup your vm´s. Shutting them down. Copy your folder witch include your vm´s.

Install ESXi on your hardware and copy your backup to the new vmfs volume.

After that, you can import your machines.

Frank

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Texiwill
Leadership
Leadership

Hello,

Moved to the vSphere ESXi forum.

So, here is the question, I have read some articles which say that the installation of ESXi will format all drives to VMFS at during the install, is this true? Do I need to remove all data from my drives so that it is not lost during the install?

Yes it will remove all data from your connected drives... it reformats the LUNs/Volumes as VMFS.

The second question is, if indeed the install does NOT format all the drives, will ESXi be able to access the Windows formatted drives? If ESXi can read the drives (and they do not get formatted during the install), then I have some additional space on the RAID array and can create a Datastore of the same size as one of the drives, copy over and repeat until all of the drives are migrated.

Sorry it does reformat all the drives/LUNs.

As I mentioned, I have 8 VMs already defined plus lots of other data (about 700 GIG) on my drives and I want to migrate to the ESXi hypervisor but don't want to lose the data in the process.

Backup everything before you reinstall the box. THat is the best answer, or install on another box then migrate over the VMs, etc. But in this case I must ask

'Do you Feel Comfortable with Your Backup?'


Best regards,
Edward L. Haletky VMware Communities User Moderator, VMware vExpert 2009, 2010

Now Available: 'VMware vSphere(TM) and Virtual Infrastructure Security'[/url]

Also available 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise'[/url]

Blogging: The Virtualization Practice[/url]|Blue Gears[/url]|TechTarget[/url]|Network World[/url]

Podcast: Virtualization Security Round Table Podcast[/url]|Twitter: Texiwll[/url]

--
Edward L. Haletky
vExpert XIV: 2009-2023,
VMTN Community Moderator
vSphere Upgrade Saga: https://www.astroarch.com/blogs
GitHub Repo: https://github.com/Texiwill
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