Fastest way to copy vmdk

[pilot8]

Hello,

I have a 200GB vmdk I wou ld like to backup. This vm  is shutdown. I would like to know what is the fastest possible way to backup this vmdk. I have a very limited time to get this file.

I am running vspher 4.0 update 1.  I am thinking of the following way..

1. setup a workstation, join it to the same network as the ESX host, run veeam fastscp, or winscp and download the 200GB vmdk to local disk.

2. setup iscsi mapped LUN on a workstation and drop the VMDK file to this drive.

3. setup new datastore on the ESX host using iscsi or nfs using a NAS/SAN box and scp the vmdk to this new store.

4. other ways to accomplish this ?

I would appreciate your feedback.

JOe

[a_p_]

What is your goal? Only backup the vmdk once?

There may be other possible options do backup a VM. While powered off, you could export the VM to OVF. If downtime is limited, create a snapshot of the VM, then copy/download the base vmdk and delete the snapshot after you are done. This may not even require downtime, although personally I would create the snapshot while the VM is powered off (for data consistency) in this case.

André

[satya1]

pilot8 wrote:

Hello,

I have a 200GB vmdk I wou ld like to backup. This vm  is shutdown. I would like to know what is the fastest possible way to backup this vmdk. I have a very limited time to get this file.

I am running vspher 4.0 update 1.  I am thinking of the following way..

1. setup a workstation, join it to the same network as the ESX host, run veeam fastscp, or winscp and download the 200GB vmdk to local disk.

2. setup iscsi mapped LUN on a workstation and drop the VMDK file to this drive.

3. setup new datastore on the ESX host using iscsi or nfs using a NAS/SAN box and scp the vmdk to this new store.

4. other ways to accomplish this ?

I would appreciate your feedback.

JOe

Hi you wan to take frequently or once upon a time.

this link recomend by vmwarewww.vmware.com/files/pdf/vcb_35_new.pdf

also can use sed Trilead's VMExplorer

Yours,

Satya

[timjwatts]

Hi,

In my limited experience:

SCP is dog slow to an ESXi host but may be better to an ESX host. You could also possibly use SFTP (not an easy option on ESXi)

Veeam FastSCP is supposed to be quick (not tried in anger)

vifs (from the command line, part of the CLI/Perl SDK for either a Windows or Linux machine) is fairly quick - about 500Mbit/sec on a gig link when I tried)

vSphere datastore GUI is a joke, speedwise.

Cheers,

Tim

[mwpreston]

If it's only a one time shot I would check out Veeam's FastSCP.  From my experience this seems to be the fastest alternative out there...

[ddk83]

Or use a backup solution like vmware vDR or Veeam backup.

or make a copy to another san (NFS,iscsi) to ssh on the ESXi.

<img src='http://imagicon.info/cat/5-59/icon_smile.gif'>