Migration using physical RDMs

[ChevUribe]

Currently there is a cluster where there is 4 hosts.

2 of the 4 hosts has a SQL VMs clustered via Microsoft Clustering.

They are sharing 1 disk (quorum disk) via physical RDM on an EMC storage.

Now the issue is that EMC storage needed to be upgraded because of a known bug and as a result, VMs should be migrated to another cluster using Huawei storage.

My question is, If I storage vMotion the primary SQL VM who has the quorum disk, will the quorum disk be migrated too?

I saw one forum that it can be converted to VMDK format, my concern is will the clustering work with it being a VMDK and not the physical RDM as configured before?

Note:

quorum disk is not visible on the VM via edit settings but can be seen in the primary VM who is currently holding the quorum disk.

Thank you!

[hussainbte]

Whats is the version of ESXi you are using(below steps apply if it is ESXi 6 and virtual hardware version of the VMs is 11)

Below linked KB could be a good thing to go through.

1)As it is a physical Mapped RDP, you can detach all RDMs from passive node (after shutting down the server will be a good option) including the quorum. Storage vMotion this to Huawei.

2)Plan a downtime and Storage vMotion the Active node by shutting it down with All the devices attached. Use vSphere web client and choose the destination disk type(thick/thin).

This should give you the node with all Physical RDMs connected converted to vmdk's, provided you have space on datastore.

you can bring it up and power on the other node and attach the drives to that by using existing disks.

The cluster will then be a Cluster in a box(with no vMotion option) and you will have to make changes in SCSI controller Bus sharing configurations and vmdk multi writer mode.

Also read the VMware MSCS cluster setup guide for ESXi 6.

Migrating virtual machines with Raw Device Mappings (RDMs) (1005241) | VMware KB

https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/6.0/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-601-setup-mscs.pdf

[ChevUribe]

VMware is in vsphere 5.5U2 (it was not yet migrated to version 6 since current external database is not supported. a database migration will be done first)

This is immediate concern since this should be done before end of august.

Does your recommendation work only in 6 but the KB includes 5.x as supported versions?

btw, migration to appliance is out of the question since there is a running HP Data Protector agent on the vCenter Server host which they use for backups.

[hussainbte]

It should apply to ESXi 5.5 U2 as well, but as the KB suggests using vSPhere web client and choose the disk format (thick is preferred)

The reason I suggested you to detach the RDM disk(disks) from 2nd node and shut it down is because it seems a clean approach