How to restore after disk failure?

#1

Hey

So I just purchased a one year subscription because why not…

Trying to see what will happen when/if my main SSD dies (both VM + ESXi boot drive)
I have everything backed up to NFS datastore and it works perfectly.

Now to restore:
./vertical restore /vmfs/volumes/datastore1 --restore-from testvm@ryzen -r 1

This results in 3 files being downloaded… testvm.vmdk + testvm-flat.vmdk in /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/vmfs/volumes/datastore1/testvm (yes, that is not a mistake on my part, it extracts it to this path) … + testvm.vmx in /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/

Why is this happening?

I want all the files to be in /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/testvm.

If I move them manually (which I’m fine doing, this is only like a worth case situation) then the disk is not thin provisioned any more :frowning:

Can you please try to help a happy customer?

Thank you very much!

#2

Okay, I feel a bit stupid now. I used cp instead of mv to move from /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/vmfs/volumes/datastore1/testvm to /vmfs/volumes/datastore1 …

Now thin provisioning is working…

But I still don’t understand why the 3 files are placed a these locations?

#3

If you pass the virtual machine name instead of the directory to the restore command it should work:

./vertical restore testvm -r 1

When you specify the directory, or if the original datastore isn’t available, it will try to restore the files to new locations by treating the original absolute path as a relative path.

#4

Thank you for your reply.

I don’t think “./vertical restore testvm -r 1” will work, if I have a complete disk failure… I’ m just preparing for what will happen, IF that happens.

But I guess I can live with having to move the files in that situation. Thanks anyway :slight_smile:

#5

So please, if I had a disk failure or an accidental data loss ora error canceling of a WM, which is the correct sequence of commands to restore a VM if the VM files and the VM directory doens’t exist anymore?
Maybe this issue (disaster recovery) could be inserted in the guide, being a common issue.
Thanks
Massimo

#6

If the VM directory doesn’t exist, you can specify the restore location together with the --restore-from option to restore the specified vm to any location:

./vertical restore /path/to/restore/location --restore-from vmname -r revision

If this command is to be run on a new ESXi host that has been initialized by the init command with a new host id, then you need to specify the original host id:

./vertical restore /path/to/restore/location --restore-from vmname@original_host_id -r revision

After yor restore the vm to the specified location, you can create a new vm using the disk files just restored.

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