How to Clone a Machine on ESXi 5.5?

[pokerdawg]

My apologies for not getting terminology right, I'm still new to this ...

I set up a Dell server with ESXi 5.5 and datastores on a QNAP box.

I have 2 copies of Windows 7 running in 2 separate datastores (1 per datastore)

I want to "clone" them but don't have that option in vSphere client and Workstation won't let me clone remotely.

Right now I have to "copy" between datastores, which takes about 1 hour for 75GB.  From what I've read, because I have hardware acceleration, a "cloning" should take just a couple of minutes.

I have found lots of instructions on "how to clone" when the software has that option, but I'm not sure what software I need to be running to be able to do this, if there is free or only paid software for this, and whether they support (as one page indicated) that the software basically tells the QNAP to clone, and the QNAP copies between two datastores, as opposed to "reading" from the QNAP back to a machine, that then writes back to the other QNAP datastore (round trip over the network, very slow).

Thank you!

[daphnissov]

I set up a Dell server with ESXi 5.5 and datastores on a QNAP box.

Any particular reason why you're newly installing an old (and unsupported) version of ESXi?

[pokerdawg]

It's been up and running for several years.  We're doing tests of some different configurations of VMs on it, but are just trying to avoid the 1 hour copying of a set of VM files to create another.  We're looking for the ability to clone.

[AmeenMunaff]

Hi,

Cloning is a feature of vCenter. I dont think you can find the option to clone from a standalone ESXi. If you still want to do it the hard way, look at this https://www.altaro.com/vmware/how-to-clone-vms-vcenter/

If you want clone from Workstation, you can right click on the VM ->manage -> clone

[Dave_the_Wave]

The way you explained it is the only way you can do it with your limited setup.

Singular hosts without vCenter, all you can do is browse the datastore, copy and paste folders. Actually the only two files needed duping are the .vmx and .vmdk, afterwards you add the .vmx to Inventory. When you run the VM, it will ask if it was moved (keeps MAC address) or copied (new MAC address generated).

Since you are using an external datastore, you may have bottlenecking on both ends, making the "round trip" symptom even worse. It's possible the Qnap box is causing this with poor performance (inability to raid quickly, lack of a bbwc, dunno).

You may want to try other ideas, such a iScsi for a datastore (freenas), or use 10Gb twinax ethernet.

Do keep us posted at how you solve this.

[ankurgoyal01]

Hi,

Take the putty on to your ESXi and then run the command vmkfstools as below:

vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/Storage1/examplevm/examplevm.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/Storage2/examplevm_clone.vmdk

Normally clone is a feature of vcenter, however by the above method you can clone the machine using putty directly.

Regards

Ankur