asked on Upgrading Win 2008 R2 file server to 2012 R2 & dedupe it during business hours ?
Hi All,
My existing production fileserver VM is running out of disk space, the specs are as follows:
Note: Both D & E drive are shared by the network UNC path to different department and then mapped using the GPO login script.
I’d like to upgrade it to Windows Server 2012 R2 Std. to compress and dedupe it to reduce disk space used because I cannot extend the VMware disk anymore.
Is there any caveats or things to consider when performing the inline OS upgrade from 2008 R2 to 2012 R2 as Windows VM ?
Once it is converted to 2012 R2, can I perform the Data Deduplication straight away without impacting the user data access during business hours ?
Any caveats and tips would be greatly appreciated.
My existing production fileserver VM is running out of disk space, the specs are as follows:
Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard SP1
2x vCPU
8 GB vRAM
C:\ 50 GB
D:\ 1.9 TB – Data 1 disk space is 97% full
E:\ 1.85 TB – Data 1 disk space is 95% full
Note: Both D & E drive are shared by the network UNC path to different department and then mapped using the GPO login script.
I’d like to upgrade it to Windows Server 2012 R2 Std. to compress and dedupe it to reduce disk space used because I cannot extend the VMware disk anymore.
Is there any caveats or things to consider when performing the inline OS upgrade from 2008 R2 to 2012 R2 as Windows VM ?
Once it is converted to 2012 R2, can I perform the Data Deduplication straight away without impacting the user data access during business hours ?
Any caveats and tips would be greatly appreciated.
Windows Server 2012Active DirectoryVMware
Last Comment
Albert Widjaja
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ASKER
Thanks all,
So I guess in this case can I just clone the VM C drive only ? The VMFS datastore is not enough to hold the other drives.
So I guess in this case can I just clone the VM C drive only ? The VMFS datastore is not enough to hold the other drives.
We would complete a full backup for rollback purposes, to us that means the entire VM.
Do you not backup any production VM before a change?
do you not have any method of change control or planning?
Do you not backup any production VM before a change?
do you not have any method of change control or planning?
ASKER
Well, there is Veeam Backup but it is backing up 1 AM.
if I took the snapshot would that be even worst ?
if I took the snapshot would that be even worst ?
I would not recommend the use of a snapshot, because when you take a snapshot performance is poor.
So manually change the job time, or manually create a backup.
It's your choice and business, I can only recommend what we do in our business!
So manually change the job time, or manually create a backup.
It's your choice and business, I can only recommend what we do in our business!
ASKER
ok, assuming the backup is already taken the night before (because it took 8-9 hours to back it up fully).
Can i just perform inline upgrade to Win 2012 R2 while keeping all the data in those file servers D & E also the mapped network drive settings to the users ?
Can i just perform inline upgrade to Win 2012 R2 while keeping all the data in those file servers D & E also the mapped network drive settings to the users ?
Can i just perform inline upgrade to Win 2012 R2 while keeping all the data in those file servers D & E also the mapped network drive settings to the users ?
Correct. You may want to stop access to the shares, whilst you complete the upgrade, before returning to production.
ASKER
ok, why do I need to stop it ?
is it to prevent file corruption during the server reboot ?
is it to prevent file corruption during the server reboot ?
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ASKER
Thanks !
Unfortunately due to the limitation of the VMFS datastore, I cannot clone the whole VM with D & E drive.
Both D & E drive are NAS shared (running on HP EVA 6400 not RDM).
Do I need to double the specs of the VM to prevent slowness issue during upgrade or data dedupe ?