USB with Hypervisor ESXi 6.5.xxx backup/restore

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uh78NhN
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun Oct 04, 2020 12:47 am

USB with Hypervisor ESXi 6.5.xxx backup/restore

Post by uh78NhN »

ESXi ver: 6.7.0_8169922 free ver

i tried the recommendation of USB Image Tool ver 1.80, from tinkertry.com/clone-esxi-with-usb-image-tool today. though he used 1.74 during his write up.

my original main ESXi USB stick was working fine but after i made a backup it no longer works. i get the Bank 5 Back 6 error that others have had. if i had read the comments before proceeding i would have seen Alex's post linking this link, https://www.alexpage.de/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=534&start=10.

so i formatted another USB stick and had USB ITool restore the recent backup image to it. same ESXi boot errors.

i did have the option "Fix GPT after Restore" checked for both backup & restore.

i see another user at thread, "Re: USB with Hypervisor ESXi 5.1 image" post his results from sgdisk print out. so here is mine...

with what sgdisk is showing, is there a way i can get this esxi stick to boot properly?

Code: Select all

sudo sgdisk --print /dev/sdb

Disk /dev/sdb: 30031872 sectors, 14.3 GiB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512/512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 41510505-AFF5-45DB-BDCB-6487E5227584
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
Main partition table begins at sector 2 and ends at sector 33
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 30031838
Partitions will be aligned on 32-sector boundaries
Total free space is 22945917 sectors (10.9 GiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1              64            8191   4.0 MiB     EF00  
   2            8224          520191   250.0 MiB   0700  
   3          520224         1032191   250.0 MiB   0700  
   4         1032224         1257471   110.0 MiB   FC00  
   5         1257504         1843199   286.0 MiB   0700  
   6         1843200         7086079   2.5 GiB     FC00 
Alex
Site Admin
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2011 11:59 pm

Re: USB with Hypervisor ESXi 6.5.xxx backup/restore

Post by Alex »

I'm don't really know the details of the ESXi environment, but the original problem was Windows re-enumbering the partitions, when it detected a change in USB device size. VM Ware expects partition numbering in a certain way (numbered 1, 5, 6 to my knowledge).

By activating the "Fix GPT after Restore" option, USB Image Tool tries to modify the GPT in a way, that Windows finds no reason for re-enumbering. For that, it's necessary to restore from an image, that has not been re-enumbered yet. If you restore from a device, that already got re-enumbered from 1,5,6 to something different, the fix will not work on the image anymore.

Maybe somebode with more knwowledge about VM Ware ESXI sees this post /partition schemeand can give a hint.
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