Users Guide
Table Of Contents
- VMware vSphere ESXi 6.x on Dell EMC PowerEdge Systems Installation Instructions and Important Information Guide
- Introduction
- Installing vSphere 6.0
- Download Dell EMC customized ESXi image
- Installing, Enabling and Disabling ESXi
- Overview - Dell NUMA Fault Resilient Memory
- Enable Dell NUMA Fault Resilient Memory
- Overview - Dell Fault Resilient Memory
- Enabling Dell Fault Resilient Memory
- Installing ESXi on flash media
- Installing ESXi on the hard drive
- Installing ESXi on the BOSS-S1 device
- Enabling or Disabling Internal SD card
- Configuring one-time boot to ESXi
- Configuring boot sequence to ESXi
- Downloading patches and updates for ESXi
- Creating vCenter Server installation media
- Installing vCenter Server
- Deploying vSphere 6.0
- Configuration back up and restore procedures
- Licensing information
- Troubleshooting ESXi
- Getting help
Configuration back up and restore procedures
NOTE: Dell EMC recommends that you back up your VMware ESXi configuration after you complete the initial setup on
a routine schedule that fits your datacenter environment. Backing up your configuration captures the license code (host
serial number).
To back up or restore the configuration information, use the VMware vSphere CLI. The vSphere CLI is available in:
• vSphere CLI package — vSphere CLI package can be installed on either Linux or on Microsoft Windows operating systems.
• vSphere Management Assistant (vMA) — vMA can be deployed on an ESXi host.
Both of these software are available for download from vmware.com. For more information on setting up and running the vSphere CLI,
see the VMware vSphere Command-Line Interface Installation and Reference Guide and VMware ESXi Embedded and vCenter Server
Setup Guide at vmware.com/support/pubs.
The back up and restore steps are given in this section considering that:
• You have already imported the vSphere CLI to a system other than the one you want to back up or restore.
• You have installed the Windows or Linux management Application Programming Interfaces (APIs).
Topics:
• Backing up the configuration of your ESXi host
• Restoring configuration of your ESXi host
Backing up the configuration of your ESXi host
To back up configuration data of a host:
1. Start the vSphere CLI.
2. Run the vicfg-cfgbackup command with the -s flag to save the host configuration to the specified backup filename:
vicfg-cfgbackup --server< ESXi-host-ip> -- portnumber <port_number> --protocol
<protocol_type> --username root --password root_password [-s <backup-filename>
The -portnumber and -protocol options are optional. If you exclude them, the defaults are port 443 and protocol HTTPS.
NOTE:
If you do not specify a password in the command line, you are prompted for one when the command executes.
For example: vicfgcfgbackup --server 172.17.13.211 --username root –s backupdate.dat
NOTE: If your administrative password includes special characters, such as $ or &, you must include a backslash
escape character (\) before each special character.
Restoring configuration of your ESXi host
To restore the configuration data of a host:
NOTE:
The backup process does not support restoring to later builds. This requirement can be overridden by using the –
f option.
1. Turn off any VM that is running on the host you want to restore.
2. Optionally, restore the host to the ESXi build number used when the backup file was created.
3. Start the vSphere CLI on a host other than the host you want to restore and log in.
4. Run the vicfg-cfgbackup command with the –l flag to load and restore the backup file to the host.
vicfg-cfgbackup --server <ESXi-host-IP> -- portnumber <port_number> --protocol
<protocol_type>-- username <username> --password <password> -l <backup_filename>
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