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davecon
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Removing a VM from Virtual Center and Reinstalling?

HI

Hopefully someone can help me with this one?

We have 6 x ESX 3.02 servers and HP EVA 4100 SAN, all in one HA cluster.

I have a Virtual machine (Win 2003 server) that was removed from Virtual center inventory by mistake, but not deleted from the SAN/Datastore. I need to re-install this VM into the HA cluster.

I Can create a new VM and use the orignal disk image file, but when this is done, it creates a new folder on the datastore with a new .vmx file but the vmdk file is in the original directory.

Basically i now have a vritual machine which has 2 x directories associated with it on the datastore. It works ok, but i dont like the idea having the vmdk and config files split accross 2 different directories.

I hope this makes sense, and i am just wondering is there not an easier/cleaner way of re-importing a vm that was removed from the inventory??

Is using VM Converter the only option?

and help would be appreciated

thanks.

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weinstein5
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welcome ot the forums - if the vm's files still exist in the datastore it is very easy to restore to your environment - just use the datastore browser in the VI Client and find where the original files are stored - select the original VMX file and right click and you should have an option to 'Add to Inventory' - if you have already readded the way you described by adding a new VM and using the existing datastore you can cold migrate as dmaster suggested or just repeating the process - remove the new vm form inventory with out removing form disk and follow my suggestion -

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dmaster
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you can use a cold migration for that and specify where you want to locate the disk files.

weinstein5
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welcome ot the forums - if the vm's files still exist in the datastore it is very easy to restore to your environment - just use the datastore browser in the VI Client and find where the original files are stored - select the original VMX file and right click and you should have an option to 'Add to Inventory' - if you have already readded the way you described by adding a new VM and using the existing datastore you can cold migrate as dmaster suggested or just repeating the process - remove the new vm form inventory with out removing form disk and follow my suggestion -

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davecon
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thanks for the quick reply. I can move the disk files, but i am wondering can i not import directly from the vmdk/vmx files in the datastore? This would avoid having to create a new vm from scratch and trying to remember what the exact hardware config was for the original vm, and also avoid having to move disk files after the creation of the vm.

Apologies if this doesnt make sense! I am still only getting used to VM

Thanks again.

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dmaster
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with a cold migration you have to power down the virtual machine, and when it's powered off you can right click on the vm and choose migrate. (this is a cold migration).

now you can specify where you want to locate your data.. without recreating the virtual machine.

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davecon
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dmaster - thanks for your suggestion, that should work well for now.

weinstein5 - thanks, thats the answer i was looking for - I knew their had to be some way of importing an existing vm from the datastore.

many thanks for the quick replies and solutions, for my first post!

Dave.

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weinstein5
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This also works for importing templates - except you point at the VMTX file -

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