Increase datastore on VMWare ESX 4.1 primary disk
I need to increase the extent on the primary datastore on our VMWare ESX 4.1 server/
When I go into the datastore to Increase the extent it doesn't show the extra space available.
On the Primary Disk/LUN we moved from RAID 1 to RAID 1+0 hence why the logical disk has increased.
Should I do something like rearrange the partitions manually in gPartEd or is there a way through the CLI?
The snapshot attached is of the partition layout on the primary disk.
extents.png
When I go into the datastore to Increase the extent it doesn't show the extra space available.
On the Primary Disk/LUN we moved from RAID 1 to RAID 1+0 hence why the logical disk has increased.
Should I do something like rearrange the partitions manually in gPartEd or is there a way through the CLI?
The snapshot attached is of the partition layout on the primary disk.
extents.png
Doesn't it have to be contiguous space to increase the size without adding an additional extent?
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hanccocka: Yes - as per screenshot. It went from 72GB (2x 72GB in RAID 1) to 292GB (4x 146GB in RAID 1+0).
Thanks for the link but it's pretty a pretty extensive procedure to do it by the looks of things.
andyalder: As far as I was aware, however I thought you could add another VMFS partition and increase over the disk if required. (As per Extents portion of screenshot).
I 'could' move the Linux partitions around to create enough contiguous space around the VMFS partition and break the mirror first to avoid screwing it up but it does mean more downtime... gPartED should be able to do it but in a way I'm flying blind.
Thanks for the link but it's pretty a pretty extensive procedure to do it by the looks of things.
andyalder: As far as I was aware, however I thought you could add another VMFS partition and increase over the disk if required. (As per Extents portion of screenshot).
I 'could' move the Linux partitions around to create enough contiguous space around the VMFS partition and break the mirror first to avoid screwing it up but it does mean more downtime... gPartED should be able to do it but in a way I'm flying blind.
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Can't see how the link/CLI is any different from the GUI, you can create a new VMFS partition on the new space and add that as another extent but you haven't created it yet.
Are you looking for an offline partition tool that can shove the Linux swap partition that VMware put there plus the other extended partitions up a bit to make some contiguous space to extend into? That's not so much a VMware question but one for the partitioning tools experts.
Are you looking for an offline partition tool that can shove the Linux swap partition that VMware put there plus the other extended partitions up a bit to make some contiguous space to extend into? That's not so much a VMware question but one for the partitioning tools experts.
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andyalder: Yeah, it might fall into another category - it's a bit harder now with ESX since ESXi is now the norm. I still miss the extended support tools that you can't install on ESXi :/
this is often one of the issues with installing ESX, onto the same set of disks which uses your datastore. (if you need to expand the datastore).
I believe the issues is the number of primary partitions (max 4) per disk.
I believe the issues is the number of primary partitions (max 4) per disk.
Quick fix would be to create another VMFS partition and add it as another extent although I don't like concatenated disk sets. Another option would be to put ESXi on a new SD card/USB stick, blow away the other partitions since they wouldn't be needed any more so extension would be into contiguous space, in effect you would be transferring the datastore to a new installation so there'd be a bit of setting up to do but it's not that long a job.
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I hope to trial a partition resize on ESX in 3 days time. Hopefully I can break the mirror which will give me space to tinker without causing irreversible damage. I'll post the results when done.
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Multiple options to the final solution. What we didn't realise was that there was another hindrance in the way.
if the size of the array/logical disk has already been increased, you may be suffering from the issue that exists when ESX has already been installed on the disks, and due to the current partition layout, it's not possible to increase the VMFS datastore. (without re-installing)