Lost ESX Install Drive in "Storage"

[PhilAngus]

Hi all,

My main boot drive crashed recently, but luckily I had a backup from not so long ago. However, the backup was created prior to me adding a virtual machine, so it doesn't appear in the list of VMs. I believe from memory I created this VM using the main disk which ESX is booting to. I can't see this disk however in Storage within the Infrastructure client. If I browse add storage, it shows me the drive buy states it will detsroy all data! Does anyone know how I can get this drive to reappear in the storage view so that I can browse to it and recover my virtual machine?

ESX 3.5 with Update 3

6 hard drives, each one with it's own VM, the first with ESX installed (and containing the missing VM)

This is not a critical VM, but I would like to get it back if I can to avoid a lot of work.

Thanks

[AndreTheGiant]

Does anyone know how I can get this drive to reappear in the storage view so that I can browse to it and recover my virtual machine?

You have to enable LVM resignature:

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/viewContent.do?externalId=9453805&sliceId=1

Andre

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[depping]

First of all you restored a backup of your ESX partition or of your VMFS partition?

I would suggest to do an fdisk -l and check if your VMFS partition is still labeled as "fb". If this is the case you will probably need to resignature your disk.

Go to the config tab of your ESX host and at Advanced settings look for LVM / EnableResignature and set it to 1. Now rescan your SCSI/HBA Controllers. If this is done set EnableResignature to 0 again. Head back to your storage view and check if your volume is available again.

Duncan

VMware Communities User Moderator | VCP | VCDX

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[PhilAngus]

Hi,

Thanks for the replies. Not exactly a restore. I made a duplication of the disk drive that ESX is installed on some weeks ago. I have done as you said and I now have a rather curious looking drive appeared called snap-10240305-vmdomain:storage. Funny thing is when I browse it, I can't see anything on it!

Cheers,

Phil

[depping]

Try browsing it from the command line / service console! Could be the vCenter view isn't updated yet.

Duncan

VMware Communities User Moderator | VCP | VCDX

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