Migrating ESXi Boot LUNs

[Child of Wonder]

Got a customer who is replacing their old Clariion with a VNX. A while back I set up their UCS environment and configured ESXi to boot from SAN. Obviously using Storage Vmotion for the VMs was a breeze but now I'm tasked with moving the boot LUNs. My original plan was to use SAN Copy, update the UCS boot from SAN policy, and presto! but as I research this more I find that ESXi is going to see the boot LUN as coming from a different target, think the LUN is a snapshot, and may refuse to boot.

NJ, lopo, or anyone else have any experience with this?

 

[LightningCrash]

Can't you slap an old HBA in a test box and try it out?

 

[mct]

Is reinstalling ESXi on each host not an option?

 

[Child of Wonder]

It is. The project is over hours so I wanted to get done ASAP.

If I have to reinstall ESXi it's not a big deal. Nothing fancy is configured on the hosts.

 

[lopoetve]

No problem unless you have a VMFS on that boot lun (ESX Classic).

 

[NetJunkie]

No problem unless you have a VMFS on that boot lun (ESX Classic).

Yeah. I'm assuming it's ESXi and in that case he doesn't really see his own boot LUN as anything. Just copy it and repoint the boot policy in UCSM and you should be fine.

 

[Child of Wonder]

Yeah. I'm assuming it's ESXi and in that case he doesn't really see his own boot LUN as anything. Just copy it and repoint the boot policy in UCSM and you should be fine.

There is a tiny 5GB VMFS volume from the leftover space of the boot LUN (no idea why). Should I delete that local datastore before the move?

 

[Child of Wonder]

Thanks for the help guys. Migrated two of the hosts with no problems. 6 more to go.

 

[lopoetve]

There is a tiny 5GB VMFS volume from the leftover space of the boot LUN (no idea why). Should I delete that local datastore before the move?

it'll be a snapshot if you don't, but meh.

 

[Child of Wonder]

it'll be a snapshot if you don't, but meh.

Meh, don't care. They weren't being used for anything.

 

[kdh]

I did san copy.. san copied the luns, powered off the vm, did a 2nd san copy, then attached the copied lun via uscs. minimal host downtime.

 

[mareao2]

Hi Child of Wonder:

Question to Child of Wonder

Finally; had you reinstall the esxi? or did you with SANCopy the Boot Lun?

I will do it the same shortly

Thanks for your answer

 

[Child of Wonder]

Hi Child of Wonder:

Question to Child of Wonder

Finally; had you reinstall the esxi? or did you with SANCopy the Boot Lun?

I will do it the same shortly

Thanks for your answer

Did not need to reinstall ESXi. Simply used SAN Copy to move the boot LUN to the new SAN, configured my hosts to boot from the new SAN, and off they went.