vcenter dies, then what?

[chulerico]

Guys,

Just trying to find out what would happen if the vcenter dies and I cannot recover it?

If I create a server and install vcenter, composer, and them add the hosts, will everything work ok in a View environment? Right now running 5 host and about 150 machines.

I have read about that same case happening with regular servers, but the only issue I remember comming up was that you would lost performance data, no vmotion, and some machines might not turn on, but after adding the host, you should be back in business.

In the near future I will add heartbeat, but for the time being, just preparing for the worst.

Thanks all.

Sam

[Linjo]

Everything will work but you will not be able to provision new machines, no refresh or recompose or do any poweroperations.

The existing VM:s and connections to them will work fine.

You should have a proper backup/restore procedure in place for the vCenter server and maybe implement heartbeat if needed.

// Linjo

[idle-jam]

@linjo i'm curious if a new vcenter is rebuilt, what happened to those linked cloned VM? can i reattach is back to a golden image?

[chulerico]

linjo,

thanks for the responce, I'm aware of those limitations, while the vcenter is down, but when the new vcenter is up and running and hosts are added, will everything be back to normal?

for now I can easily have a backup of vcenter, but it won't be up to date, thats one of the issues.

thanks again.

Sam

[idle-jam]

chulerico, the most important is the mssql database. you can have sql management studio to dump out the backup file on preset schedule. that can be served as a form of data backup.

[Linjo · Accepted solution]

Well no, with the linked clones there are specific UID:s that are associated with a specific vCenter, there are also some RSA encryption keys that are stored in the SQL DB.

I would strongly advice to backup the vCenter properly.

// Linjo