Removing Data store from few esxi hosts in a esxi hosts cluster

[pan1268]

Hello Experts,

Actually I have a situation where in one of the Data store is presented to multiple ESXI hosts cluster and now I need to remove this data store from one of the cluster. I already know the process of how to properly remove the data store from the ESXI hosts form the following KB (https://kb.vmware.com/kb/2004605). But in my case the data store needs to be removed from set of ESXI hosts and not all the ESXI hosts(in vCenter) and I will have VMs running on them.

The steps I could think of is :

1) Ensure the VM are not running on the ESXI hosts from where the data store need to be removed.

2) Unmount the data store and select only the hosts form where it needs to be unmounted.

3) Detach the LUN only form those esxi hosts from where it is required (or unmounted).

Now, if i do the above steps I am not following the pre requisites - like - a) datastore  should not be part of the DS cluster ; b) data store should not be running any VM etc....

Is this procedure correct ? or i need to follow some other steps.

Please advice.

Many thanks in advance.

Regards

Pan

[vHaridas]

Hi,

Process mentioned by you is correct.

Also make sure Datastore is not being used for HA heartbeat,  for scratch partition, coredump location for those esxi hosts, io control is disabled.

Make Sure esxi host do not have any VM running with any vmdk on data store which you are unmounting.

[pan1268]

Hi vHardias,

Many thanks for your reply. Actually, I just thought about another solution :

Lets say I have :

DS1 - New empty data store

DS2 - The data store which needs to be unpresented from some of the esxi hosts

Now, svMotion all the VMs to the DS1 from DS2 and then completely delete( unmount and detach)  the DS2  from all the ESXI hosts. I can change both host and data store by using the web client.

Which solution will be best recommended post 1 or post2.

Please advice

Regards

[vHaridas]

if VMs total size is not much then  you can go for second options of adding new DS to few Hosts and moving VMs to new DS.

However if VMs total size in TB or you have more number of VMs then first option is preferred.

Just make sure if you unmounts DS from few host, you need to mask it or un-present it from storage side to those specific Hosts and present it to Host where you need to retain DS.

Same applies to new DS, present new DS to only required Host from storage side.