Need help fast regarding vmkfstools, cloning and snapshot consolidation - not sure i am doing it right

[lonyl]

I got this from a.p.:

I modified the parentCID in "Datapark.SBS2011-000003.vmdk" to fix the snapshot chain. What I would suggest is to upload the file to the datastore, and then clone the virtual disk to ensure the current data files remain untouched in case something doesn't work as expected.

To clone the virtual disk run the following command:

vmkfstools -i "Datapark.SBS2011-000002.vmdk" "Datapark.SBS2011-Clone.vmdk" -d thin -a lsilogic

The command uses Datapark.SBS2011-000002.vmdk - which is the latest active snapshot file in the chain - as the source, and creates a clone virtual disk, in which all the data from all snapshots will be consolidated. Once the cloning is done, you may attach the clone to a VM. Depending on what happened while the base virtual disk was attached to a VM, there might be some corruption. However, due to the sizes of the snapshots you should be able to recover most of your data.

He probably went to sleep, and i need to start the cloning as soon as possible.

Is it ok to run the command, or is it deleting all snapshot files?

As he said, "to ensure the current data files remain untouched in case somethoing is going wrong", the clone command seems to delete all snapshot files.

Anyone who can confirm?

Best regards

Morty

[npadmani · Accepted solution]

vmkfstools -i "Datapark.SBS2011-000002.vmdk" "Datapark.SBS2011-Clone.vmdk" -d thin -a lsilogic

Is it ok to run the command, or is it deleting all snapshot files?

It's not going to do anything to your source files.

it will simply read chain of delta along with base disk of your VM, and Clone them to a consolidated file called "Datapark.SBS2011-Clone.vmdk"

[lonyl]

Thank you for your answer.

How long should i expect this process to last with 280GB of snapshots and a base disk of 500GB?

Best regards

Morty