Big problems after upgrade from ESXi U2 to U3

[dbaskin]

So I am fairly new to ESXi, only a few months running this server.

edit I think the problem was this. When I created VM1 and opened the old V disk from the old DIR it was only a single file and it opened fine. When I created VM2 and opened the old disk from the old DIR it couldn't find the other files because it looked in the new DIR. DOH! and then after I moved all of the disk files to the new dir then it didn't work and gave me the parent has changed message. /edit

So, it all started when I tried to use the VMware Infrastructure Update app on my workstation to update my ESXi server. After the update I rebooted and the server never came back up. I thought, my setup is basic I will just re-create a new USB drive with the current U3 and boot off that and re-setup ESXi.

So I did that and was able to create a new VM for server 1 and use my old virtual disk from server 1 and it booted up and worked just fine.

Then I created a new VM for server 2 and used my old virtual disk from server 2 and when it booted up it was not the right server... but it was the only virtual hard disk I could pick in that DIR. After I looked again using the datastore browser I noticed snapshot files. So I had booted into an old snapshot, or I guess the base snapshot. But all my data is in the newest 2 snapshot files. Which I can't mount as a virtual hard drive.

I got the error "..... reason: the parent virtual disk has been modified since the child was created."

So where I am now is I have booted more than once the base snapshot without the current snapshots and they don't seem to want to hook up after that base one was booted and changed.

Is there anyway for me to get the data from this mess?

Any and all help and input is greatly apprciated!

[dbaskin]

kind of a ramble but I think it gets the point across, it is 1:00am and server 2 does do my mail so I will keep digging in an effect to tackle this. Maybe I will get lucky and someone is around with something helpful tonight

[dbaskin]

old VM was named SDPN05

new VM is ES03

I moved all the files from the old DIR to the new DIR and renamed all the files except the disks from SDPN05.* to ES03.*

so this is how the DIR looks now

[dbaskin]

so it looks like I need to edit the parentCID in the snapshot files...

http://driveactivated.com/blog/archive/2007/11/06/recovering-vmware-snapshot-after-parent-changed.as...

[dbaskin]

so I tried to copy the disk files to my workstation to edit them and I keep getting IO errors on the download. Any other way to edit the files?

[dbaskin]

So after I try and copy the virtual disks it copies a 1k file and then tries the whole file and thats when I get the IO error.

But that 1k file is the file i was thinking I needed to edit. So i edited the one for the first snapshot SDPN05-000001.vmdk and updated parentCID from the SDPN05.vmdk file. Still didn't work. not getting the error about the parent being changed, it just boots the old old and doesn't seem to try the snapshot at all.

1. Disk DescriptorFile

version=1

CID=05326125

parentCID=097e194c

createType="vmfsSparse"

parentFileNameHint="SDPN05.vmdk"

1. Extent description

RW 62914560 VMFSSPARSE "SDPN05-000001-delta.vmdk"

1. The Disk Data Base

#DDB

ddb.toolsVersion = "7302"

[dbaskin]

I am going to give up for now and sleep for a few hours and try again in the morning.

1. Disk DescriptorFile

version=1

CID=097e194c

parentCID=ffffffff

createType="vmfs"

1. Extent description

RW 62914560 VMFS "SDPN05-flat.vmdk"

1. The Disk Data Base

#DDB

ddb.virtualHWVersion = "4"

ddb.uuid = "60 00 C2 94 b2 69 59 e9-01 54 d6 17 b6 32 3f 6c"

ddb.geometry.cylinders = "3916"

ddb.geometry.heads = "255"

ddb.geometry.sectors = "63"

ddb.adapterType = "lsilogic"

ddb.toolsVersion = "7302"

[kooltechies · Accepted solution]

Hi,

You can take a look at my post in this thread.

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1167519#1167519

Thanks,

Samir

[dbaskin]

its running....

1% done....

[dbaskin]

I think that did it.

Thank you VERY much!!!!!!

:smileylaugh:

[dbaskin]

So next I am going to build a new VM and mirgrate to that one and delete this one just to be safe....

Thanks again!