What is storage vMotion in VMware?

With Storage vMotion, you can migrate a virtual machine and its disk files from one datastore to another while the virtual machine is running. With Storage vMotion, you can move virtual machines off of arrays for maintenance or to upgrade.

How do I move my virtual machine storage?

Procedure

  1. Right-click the virtual machine and select Migrate.
  2. Click Change storage only and click Next.
  3. Select the format for the virtual machine’s disks.
  4. Select a virtual machine storage policy from the VM Storage Policy drop-down menu.
  5. Select the datastore location where you want to store the virtual machine files.

Does vMotion require shared storage?

vMotion does not require environments with shared storage. This is useful for performing cross-cluster migrations, when the target cluster machines might not have access to the storage of the source cluster. Processes that are working on the virtual machine continue to run during the migration with vMotion.

How does storage vMotion work?

How Does Storage vMotion Process Work?

  1. The VM home directory is copied to the destination datastore along with the config, log, swap, and any snapshots).
  2. The resulting “shadow” VM is made operational on the destination datastore.
  3. VMware vSphere then begins copying data to the destination datastore.

How do I use datastore vMotion?

  1. First login to vSphere web client. Choose the VM which storage you want to migrate.
  2. Right click the VM which storage you want to migrate. Choose the option “Migrate.”
  3. Migration Wizard will open here.
  4. Here you can do multiple things.
  5. Now we are ready to do Storage vMotion.

What happens if datastore is full?

When a datastore runs out of space, thin-provisioned virtual disks can no longer dynamically grow to accommodate additional storage demand. When VMware ESX detects this condition, virtual machines in need of additional storage are instantly paused to prevent guest operating systems from failing.

Can you move a virtual machine to another drive?

You can now use the VirtualBox Manager to move a VM. Right-click on the VM in the VirtualBox Manager’s machine list and select Move. Alternatively, use the VBoxManage movevm command which is introduced in this release.

How do I move a VMDK to another datastore?

To proceed with move, from vSphere Web Client right click the virtual machine to migrate VMDK files then select Migrate option. To hot move VMDKs to different datastores without service interruption, VMware vSphere 5.5 has a feature called Storage vMotion. Select Change datastore option then click Next.

What is vMotion used for?

VMware® VMotion™ enables the live migration of running virtual machines from one physical server to another with zero downtime, continuous service availability, and complete transaction integrity. VMotion is a key enabling technology for creating the dynamic, automated, and self- optimizing data center.

What happens when datastore runs out of space?