How to Take Backup of ESXi Host and Restore from Backup?

Objective

This lab aims to guide you to take a complete backup of your ESXi host and restore it whenever required.

Prerequisites

• Access of vCenter through vSphere Web Client.
• Access of CLI of ESXi Host and SSH enabled.
• Knowledge of Basic ESXi commands: im-cmd.

Lab Overview

After completing this lab, you will be able:

1. Understand the need for Backup and Restore of ESXi servers
2. To back up the ESXi host in the .tgz file
3. To restore the ESXi host from the backup file
4. Verify the restoration of ESXi Host and Unregistered VMs

Step-by-Step Lab Guide

PART-I Taking backup of ESXi host

1. Open vSphere host client and Login to ESXi host (sa-ESXi-01 –> 172.20.10.51) using root.
2. View all details of the ESXi host as we will back up the sa-ESXi-01 host for backup.
3. Access the console of an ESXi-01 as a root through SSH, as we will take file-based backup using commands.
4. First, sync the configuration setting of the ESXi host using:vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/sync_config
5. Now Take backup using the command: vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/backup_configIt will give a URL for downloading the backup bundle in .tgz file format.
6. Copy the URL and replace FQDN or IP of the ESXi host with *. Here we replaced * with 172.20.10.51 IP. Now using the wget command, download the backup in the current directory.
7. Create Directory “Backup” under VMFS01-01 datastore.
8. Copy this .tgz backup file to /vmfs/volumes/VMFS01-01/Backup path.
9. Cross-check from the datastore tab of the ESXi host client that this backup file should be available in the Backup folder of VMFS01-01 datastore.
10. 

PART-II To restore ESXi from Back Up file.

1. Go to ESXi Host web client and unregister one VM – Ubuntu Server from ESXi host– so automatic VM restoration happens after backup.
2. copy the backup bundle file from the datastore folder to the /tmp directory.
3. Put ESXi host into maintenance mode using command and cross verify from ESXi host web client.vim-cmd hostsvc/maintenance_mode_enter
4. Rename the backup file to configBundle.tgz
5. Now restore the backup using the following command:vim-cmd hostsvc/firmware/restore_config /tmp/configBundle.tgz Here, reboot the ESXi host as we are restoring from the backup.
6. Now log in to the ESXi host client again and verify the automatic restoration of the VM – Ubuntu Server and backup.

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