Configuring VCB to connect to SAN without writing a windows signature to the LUN

[chrisglutz]

Hi,

We are working to setup VCB and are preparing to connect it to our EMC Symmetric. The question we has is since VCB is running on Windows 2003 with NTFS file partitions and the LUNs used by ESX are configured to use VMFS. How do we connect the Windows 2003 server to the VMFS mounts without writing information to the LUN or changing the information already on the lun? We are using an Emulex HBA on the Windows 2003 server. The Server will be placed into the same SAN zone as the ESX machines.

Sorry for the basic question -- I am finding the documentation to be very vague.

[NCST8]

You need to use Diskpart on your VCB proxy and disable the automount.

-Jon-

[crazex]

Sorry, that last response was from me, just realized I was logged in with a different account.

-Jon-

[chrisglutz]

So, by disable the windows automount as stated in the documentation and then I guess the VCB does not use the windows mount to connect

[crazex · Accepted solution]

VCB uses the VCB framework to mount the snapshots, not the Windows mounting.

-Jon-

[BUGCHK]

The VCB framework on the proxy uses a special device driver that creates a new LUN inside Windows. This LUN is a block-mapping to the VMDK-file of the virtual machine. If a VM uses multiple VMs, the framework creates multiple LUNs.

Unfortunately, such a LUN is writeable - DO NOT WRITE TO THE DISK YOUSELF!

The DISKPART commands mentioned above tell Windows not to write on its own.