barrelscrapings's Posts

So just to preface, I dont l want to intrude.My data is not vauable this is purley a learning experience.   I work IT and have SOME experience, but I am very much and the begining of Vmware journy. As I am starting to roll out VM deploys a, I like to break my labs and restore them.. so I can fix issues for my clients. Its the only way I know how to learn   Ive run into an issue which I am unable to solve:   I have a proliant dl380 gen 7 running RAID 5 on a P410i RAID controller. The disks are all 900gb HP 2.5inch SAS drives (not that it matters).   I decided to move these drives and replace them with SSD's in order to pass them through the controller, apparrently this is possible only if I wipe the drives (hba mode not available) - when I went to return the SAS drives, I found I had forgotten the order.   I did not think much of that, and when prompted, I launched the array utlity iso and managed somewhat to get the original RAID 5 to be shown.   I was not prompted to rebuild the array however it did tell me that I may incur some dataloss as the drives where not in the exact order? I cant remembe the exact errorr to be honest.   Launching into ESXI 7, I found the datastores where not seen, and I saw a new error about the scratch folder, something about it not being configured (I wish I could remember).   So, I thought it would be best to reinstall, I wiped the SD card and upgraded to ESXI 8.   I have found the VMFS partition, and there is reference to the "Main volume" when running:   [root@localhost:/dev/disks] offset="128 2048"; for dev in `esxcfg-scsidevs -l | grep "Console Device:" | awk {'print $3'}`; do disk=$dev; echo $disk; partedUtil getptbl $disk; { for i in `echo $offset`; do echo "Checking offset found at $i:"; hexdump -n4 -s $((0x100000+(512*$i))) $disk; hexdump -n4 -s $((0x1300000+(512*$i))) $disk; hexdump -C -n 128 -s $((0x130001d + (512*$i))) $disk; done; } | grep -B 1 -A 5 d00d; echo "---------------------"; done /vmfs/devices/disks/mpx.vmhba32:C0:T0:L0 gpt 3740 255 63 60088320 1 64 204863 C12A7328F81F11D2BA4B00A0C93EC93B systemPartition 128 5 208896 2306047 EBD0A0A2B9E5443387C068B6B72699C7 linuxNative 0 6 2308096 4405247 EBD0A0A2B9E5443387C068B6B72699C7 linuxNative 0 7 4407296 60088286 4EB2EA3978554790A79EFAE495E21F8D vmfsl 0 --------------------- /vmfs/devices/disks/naa.600508b1001c1bf8a053590733375ffb gpt 656623 255 63 10548655152 1 2048 10548652032 AA31E02A400F11DB9590000C2911D1B8 vmfs 0 Checking offset found at 2048: 0200000 d00d c001 0200004 1400000 f15e 2fab 1400004 0140001d 4d 61 69 6e 20 56 6f 6c 75 6d 65 00 00 00 00 00 |Main Volume.....| 0140002d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 |................| --------------------- /vmfs/devices/disks/naa.600508b1001c2863757871ad9c529fbf unknown 486397 255 63 7813971632 --------------------- My understanding is, the parition looks healthy? Though, I am still unable to find the datastores.   Looking at the raw data, it seems to be intact, at the very least I can parse bits and peices of information like this:   Sorry for the spam, but gives you an idea of what I mean:   ����:���:m���c8��D�:�<�~ `VaE�UaE�U@E�U�VdmdX����:���� �lP��UP��U��U�dmdf��> ���:����NJ`�NJ`�NJ`��dmdf�� ��:��R�`PQU�D�:�<�q@�Z�NJ`�NJ`�NJ`�Zdmdf��`�h�p�x������������������������������������ �(�0�8�@�H�P�`�h�p�x������������������������������������ �(�0�8�@�H�P�X�`�h�p�x������������������������������������ �(�0�@��:��n �:�R�`PQU�D�:�<�� �` ��U��U&��U�` dmd��`��:�k ����d��d��d�dmdf �����:�} by �/�6/d�6/d�6/d�dmdf � ����:��%@� t��Ut��Ut��U�dmdf@GI����:��Z&���K��UK��UX��U��dmdf�. | - .sdd.sf | - Server 2022 | - ISO | - .locker | | - cache | | | - loadESX | | - tmp | | - core | | - var | | | - tmp | | - vmware | | | - lifecycle | | - downloads | | - log | | - store | | - locker | | | - packages | | | | - var | | | | | - db | | | | | | - locker | | | | | | | - addons | | | | | | | - vibs | | | | | | | - reservedVibs | | | | | | | - bulletins | | | | | | | - solutions | | | | | | | - baseimages | | | | | | | - manifests | | | | | | | - reservedComponents | | | | | | | - profiles | | - vdtc | | - healthd | - vmkdump | - *redacted* 2.0 | - VPN Server | - ezpz | - Docker Experiments | - macback | - pfSense | - testing | - Backup's | - webserver | - RC test | - mac | - Proxmox Backup | - mac2 | - macOS | - DNS | - PROXMOX BACKUP SERVER | - Windows 10 Enterprise | - VPN client | - omv ����:���8���c��c��c�dmdf ����:�J $r���U���U��U�dmdfD D > � ��:�. 7@ 9 7>dy�,d 7>d�9dmdf�1�1 `��(� � � �� � � ������������������( �0 �8 �@ �H �P �X �` �h �p �x �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� �� � � � � � �( I hope I'm missing something really dumb, like a command to force scan for datastores..   things that I've tried:   mounting via vmfs6-fuse with live debian 11 environment - it complains about a bad magic number which is far above my paygrade.    ran testdisk, got to 1% after an hour and decided my time is better spent posting this   More than happy to try anything, keen to document my findings even If I fail - for myself and those learning.   Pls ignore if people actuallyneed help this is not urgent at all   Cheers goodnight -   Nathan