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Ryan Schurman

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Recover from Failed ESX Host (No HA)

I have two VMware ESX 3.5 hosts connected to shared storage.  Since I currently don't have a license for VMware HA or FT, what is the best way to quickly get my VMs running again if a host fails?--preferably on the other ESX host until the failed one is repaired.

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ryder0707
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On the other surviving host, browse datastore to the location of the vmx file, register or add to inventory and the registered vm is now ready to start
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Ryan Schurman

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That doesn't work.  It says that the specified key, name, or identifier already exists due to the fact that the VM files have a lock on them.  This is because they were running on the ESX host before it failed.  How can I override this lock?
Can't restart the services on a failed ESX host.  That article applies if the error occurred on VMs being migrated from a running ESX host.
I'm assuming you have VCS, So you have two standalone esx hosts?
Fyi, if you are using vmfs based datastore, esx dont actually lock the VM, if the VM is registered & running on one host, the vmfs will actually do the locking to prevent other host to start the same VM unless you are using NFS based datastore then it is different story
Yes, we have vCenter Server 2.5 with 2 hosts added to it (each host has 8 unique VMs).  They are not clustered, but are connected to the same shared storage array.  If one ESX dies, how do I get rid of the lock on the VMFS that you described, or simply start those VMs on another ESX?  Do I have to set up a new ESX with the same name?
So you are saying restarting the vCenter service does not fix the problem?
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Paul Solovyovsky
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Thank you, I had forgotten to remove the failed host from vCenter.  
Which lck file you deleted? I'm sure there are no lck file in vmfs datastore so perhaps you are using nfs?