Cluster to migrate VM's

[Brononius]

Today, I've got an old Cisco Blade server with about 10 VM's under proxmox 5.0.9.
But this server use a lot of electricity, noise, heating..., so I'm looking to use other hardware.

My idea is now to move the VM's from one server towards another one through the cluster config.
I've installed proxmox (also 5.0.9) on new hardware, and wanted to create a cluster between both of them. But I'm a bit scared after reading https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Proxmox_VE_4.x_Cluster. I'm afraid of losing my current VM's. How risky is this part?

Or should I better export each VM and import it on the other side instead of moving it 'clusterwise'?


ps My problem today is that my backup server is also on this installation. So loosing the 'running configs' will result in a lot of manual restoration. :$

 

[LnxBil]

The simplest solution would be backup & restore.

What version is 5.0.9?

 

[Rob Loan]

are they on ZFS? I did this last week:

pvebak# pve-zsync sync -source 101 -name 101pve2 -dest pve2:rpool/data -verbose
pve2# cp `ls /var/lib/pve-zsync/data/101* | head -1` /etc/pve/nodes/$HOSTNAME/lxc/101.conf
pve2# rcp pvebak:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm/101 pve1:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm
pve2# rcp pvebak:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm/101 pve2:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm
pve2# rcp pvebak:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm/101 pve3:/var/lib/rrdcached/db/pve2-vm
pvebak# pct stop 101
pvebak# pve-zsync sync -source 101 -name 101pve2 -dest pve2:rpool/data -verbose
pve2# pct start 101
pvebak# pve-zsync destroy -source 101 -name 101pve2
# start at boot=no on pvebak

 

[Brononius]

What version is 5.0.9?

pve-manager/5.0-9/c7bdd872 (running kernel: 4.10.8-1-pve)

This is the latest BETA version that I've installed. I had some issues with reboots of VM, and somebody advised me to install this version to solve the issue.

are they on ZFS? I did this last week:

What's ZFS? Are you talking abou the new kind of file-system? :$
The systems are completely separated from each other. So not sure if I can do anything with the file system.


I thought to migrate, I would just needed to do:

1. Add ServerA and ServerB in a cluster config.
2. ServerA starts to replicate/copy the 10 VM's towards ServerB
3. I stop ServerA
4. Keep ServerB

But seen the warning on the cluster howto, I'm a bit scared to loose my VM's. :$

I've read it again, and is it correct when I say that when I created the cluster on ServerA, and join afterwards ServerB afterwards, it's not a problem?
That the problem will only exist if I created the cluster on ServerB, and join ServerA afterwards?

 

[czechsys]

If you don't want use blade after vm migration, the better way can be this (ofc, new pve5 must be configured same as blade pve5 - disks, networks, etc)
1] stop VMs
2] copy VMs to datastore on new system
3] copy configs to pve dir on new system
4] modifiy configs, if there are some changes (datastore paths, networks, etc).
5] test VMs on new system, possibly modify 4] again
6] if all ok, backup old VMs/configs, after some time more, delete all from blade

 

[fortechitsolutions]

Footnote for what is worth - definitely don't create a cluster spanning (old, new hardware) - if all you want to do is move VMs from old to new. Either do backup-restore of the VMs, or just copy over the VM disk images and config files etc to punt things across from old to new. Building and then presumably de-configuring the cluster / retiring the unwanted hardware from the cluster - is more effort than you really want. Unless you absolutely needed live migration of the VMs which I don't think is an issue here

Tim

 

[Brononius]

I've just ended with the backup-restore of the vm's.
Not so hard once you know what to do. :$

What I've done:

1] stop VMs
2] take a backup of 'stopped' system (Proxmox > VM > backup > backup now with mode stop)
3] copy backup files in /var/lib/vz/dump from old to new system
4] Restore the backup (Proxmox > local > content > restore)


ps I just had to 'reinstall' 2 servers, since these contained a lot of data, a backup would give me diskspace issues.


Thanks a lot for your suggestions!