VMWare ESXi Datastore lost on cloning.

How did you install the original ESXi?  This version is non-configurable so I presume you had the data stores on another partition or disk... ...you only talk about a single 3.5" disk so I am presuming that you partitioned this and put your data stores and ESXi on this?

If the above is correct, then the most likely thing is that you only transferred the ESXi partition - does that sounds likely?  How were you managing the previous ESXi installation (I.e. what method did you use to configure the system when you first set it up?)

Did Ghost4Linux  image the the VMFS filesystem?  I wouldn't think it would recognize it.  Perhaps you can add the 3.5" drive to the new server as a slave, read the VMFS with ESXi and then migrate the virtual hard disks to a new datastore elsewhere.

Personally I would connect this SATA hard disk with your VMFS partition to any Windows PC.

then use the Open Source VMFS Driver to READ the Contents of the disk, and transfer to ESXi, using Veeam FastSCP or Datastore browser.

http://code.google.com/p/vmfs/

@Roylong, the basic ESXi installation puts the datastore in a different partition automatically. They are linux partitions.  But the Ghost software I used cloned all partitions.  So I know for sure the required partitions are on the disk somewhere.

@Duffme, The Ghost4Linux clones the entire disk, including all partitions. So again, I know the data is one the drive somewhere. With regards to adding the 3.5" to the server, there are no free suitable SATA ports, or power connectors for connecting this drive.

@hanccoka, this was my fall back plan, but as there is almost 1Tb of data, even with FastSCP, that would take a long time, hence keeping that as a backup plan.

To all above thanks for your suggestions.  I am 100% positive the data is on the new disk, I just need to find it to use it.  I will keep looking for possible reasons why it is not visible.

Thanks  

Check that the cloned disk has a VMFS partition on it, with fdisk at the console prompt on ESXi.

I would not trust a clone, and either connect the original disk to the new server, or another PC, and transfer the data.

I think what hanccocka and I are supposing that the imaging might have only cloned recognized partitions or copied them as some unknown type.  

Does your installation of "old" ESXi also occupy the the disk as well as the VMFS datastore, or does the disk just contain the VMFS datastore as one partition?

e.g. are there any other partitions on this disk?

One the old server the ESXi and VMFS we both on a single SATA disk. On the new server they are both on the same logical drive which is actually a RAID5 array.

So this old disk has an ESXi installation and VMFS?

If so, it's the 4 Primary Partition limit, that is causing the Increase VMFS issue.

You would need to ensure the VMFS occupies the entire disk, with no other partitions.

I agree it is the 4 primary partition limit preventing me adding an new partition, but that should not have prevented me from extending an existing partition.

I have solved this problem by adding an additional drive to the new server, moving all the VMs to the temp drive.  Then I reinstalled ESXi on the RAID array, using the entire VDisk. I then copied all the VMs back again.

I noticed there were a number of posts on the net about increasing the size of partitions of ESXi disks.  This seems to be a known issue, with many fixes when using ESXi 4, but none explaining how to fix it with ESXi 5.

I have selected this as the answer, as none of the other suggestions actually fixed my problem.