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chrisb101
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Copy off a VMDk after a snapshot

Hi All,

Apologies if some has already asked this, I did some searching but couldn't find anything obvious. I have 2 x 3.5 esxi servers but both are using local storage. unfortunatly its going to be some time before I can get some shared storage into place so i was wondering if there was a quick way to take a copy of these machines without powering them down. The copies wont be powered up, its just so i have a copy of the vm. No VC so cloning isn't available.

If you take a snapshot of a VM are you able to take a copy of the original vmdk and then snapshot would be committed after a succesful copy?

I was also about using vmware converter to take a copy but was unsure how it would leave the original machine?

Hope this makes sense.

Thanks all...

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AndreTheGiant
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Sorry... I haven't see the "wont" near power-off.

So you want to make a copy of a running VM?

In this case I suggest (to have consistent copy) to power-off (when you can), copy all files exempt the vmdk files, take a snap, power on the VM, and then copy only the .vmdk and -flat.vmdk file (and not the delta files).

In this way you have a complete copy.

Another solution is install the converter inside the VM and run a conversion, but in this case you have VSS consisten copy of your VM.

Andre

Andrew | http://about.me/amauro | http://vinfrastructure.it/ | @Andrea_Mauro

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AndreTheGiant
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A copy is a copy (the original will remain there).

So snapshot are not necessary.

You can use datastore browser or VMware Converter to copy the VM files.

Andre

Andrew | http://about.me/amauro | http://vinfrastructure.it/ | @Andrea_Mauro
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chrisb101
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Hi Andre,

Thanks for your quick reply. The only reason I was thinking of a snapshot was incase it unlocked the original VMDk file then allowing me to copy the file off?

I need to leave the vm's powered on if possible?

Thanks for your help

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chrisb101
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Hi Andre,

Thanks for your quick reply. The only reason I was thinking of a snapshot was on the off chance it unlocked the original VMDk file then allowing me to copy the file off?

I need to leave the vm's powered on if possible?

Thanks for your help

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AndreTheGiant
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Sorry... I haven't see the "wont" near power-off.

So you want to make a copy of a running VM?

In this case I suggest (to have consistent copy) to power-off (when you can), copy all files exempt the vmdk files, take a snap, power on the VM, and then copy only the .vmdk and -flat.vmdk file (and not the delta files).

In this way you have a complete copy.

Another solution is install the converter inside the VM and run a conversion, but in this case you have VSS consisten copy of your VM.

Andre

Andrew | http://about.me/amauro | http://vinfrastructure.it/ | @Andrea_Mauro
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arturka
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hi

if you don't wan't to power down VM's you can simply make clone of vm, using e.g Vmware Converter 4.0.1 standalone version, you can choose where to store vmdk's, should be thick or thin provisioning, if it would be oly copy then you should choose thin provisioning to save space on datastore

if the VM's are win2k3 or higher you will not have any outage for them

only win2k needs to be restarted after converter agent installation

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www.vmwaremine.com

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