vExpert

How to remove a host from a vSAN cluster

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This blog post, I call blog posts like these “quick & dirty posts”, will show you today how to remove an ESXi host permanently from your vSAN cluster. Yes. Permanently. Forever.

Usually, you’re adding more capacity to a cluster, which means adding more hosts or disks to solve that problem. However, some legitimate reasons exist to remove an ESXi host from a vSAN cluster. Maybe you’re currently in the middle of a hardware renewal. The new hardware is already installed and running in production. And now, server by server, you’re removing the old hardware because you’re on track with the workload migration. The same counts for adding a cluster with nodes that have more “meat by the bone”, more compute power, and storage capacity. Nodes that are running more energy-efficient than the old ones. You see, only two reasons, but there might be many more.

But let’s dive into this topic now.

How to remove an ESXi host from a vSAN cluster?

We’re starting with making sure that the cluster and the disk groups have enough space to have one host removed. If the cluster is fine, let’s move on to remove the host.

Place the host into maintenance mode

Right-click the host, choose “Maintenance Mode”, then “Enter Maintenance Mode”.

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How to add a new host to a vSAN cluster

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This blog post, I call blog posts like these “quick & dirty posts”, will show you today how to add an ESXi host to your vSAN cluster. You may need additional compute power, and/or storage capacity. Or you want to implement another storage policy to leverage storage efficiency and more failures to tolerate (RAID 5 / RAID 6 erasure coding). Maybe you want to create a stretched cluster, which needs an even number of vSAN nodes on each side plus a vSAN witness. So many reasons to add another vSAN node.

But let’s dive into this topic now.

How to add a new host to a vSAN cluster?

In my vSAN cluster, based on the Express Storage Architecture (ESA), I’ve got six hosts currently. I want to add another host to the cluster because of the computing and storage power. How to do this?

Right-click your cluster and choose “Add Hosts…”. So far, nothing special.

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How to shut down a vSAN cluster – and start it again

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Just a few weeks ago, to my shame, I stumbled across an interesting feature in VMware vSphere when trying some things with vSAN. To be honest, and to make it clear before we dive into this topic in this blog post: I screwed up when I tested this feature the first time. Because I didn’t know about this feature and because I didn’t proceed as I should have, as per this feature. At the end I had to reinstall all my vSAN nodes and create a new clean environment after that I screwed up. It was somehow needed anyway because of the most recent homelab rebuild. So, somehow a win-win for me and the lab.

So don’t screw up! No, just kidding. you may know the feature better than me. And I can tell you, vSAN is stronger and more resilient than you may think.

In this blog post, I’d like to show you how to shut down a vSAN cluster, and how to start it again. The feature is hidden in plain view, right-click the vSAN cluster and you’re good to go. Or not?

In this blog post, I’m assuming that the vCenter is NOT running on the vSAN cluster. I may update this blog post, or create another one, with vCenter running on the cluster. Without searching the internet and checking the VMware docs, I don’t know by heart if this is even possible. Anyway. So how do you shut down the vSAN cluster?

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Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows – The network location cannot be reached

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This blog post is the first with Veeam as a topic for years! I can only hope that it helps at least some people struggling with the same problem I had.

I’m a PC gamer. Still. When I find some time for fun and games, you may find me on the grounds of Battlefield 2042, or maybe I’m driving a tractor in Farming Simulator 2022. My gaming computer is still capable of playing the most recent games. Maybe not with the best graphics and most recent graphic technologies, but they run and make fun.

Anyways.

On this gaming PC, I’ve installed the Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows (the free one). Since ages. It works well, but sometimes, the backup fails. Even if you have your games available on demand to be downloaded at any time (Steam, EA, Ubisoft, etc.) and don’t need to install the games from DVDs anymore, it is still annoying if your disk goes bad or something screws up your Windows. I’m using a Synology NAS as my backup target, connected over a 10 Gbit/s ethernet link. The computer itself is equipped with some Samsung NVMe SSDs, so even a full backup is done pretty quickly.

The point is that the computer always takes some time until the network connection is ready and working fine. That’s by design. You log in with Windows Hello, for example, the Desktop is loading, and somewhen the LAN connection is also ready. But Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows already started its job (in case it’s scheduled and if it has missed that time slot) before the network is ready. And this job will fail because the network is not yet ready.

Error: [PCNAME] Failed to get disk free space. The network location cannot be reached.

I searched for a while on the internet and stumbled across a Veeam forum post. There they mentioned enabling the “When backup target is connected” function.

I enabled this feature and tried it out. It worked.

The backup job will now usually succeed.

Yes, usually. Veeam Agent still starts the job before the network is ready (directly after logging in to Windows). And this job may fail. But the job will start again as soon as there is connectivity to your NAS (SMB share). And this time, the job runs just fine and successful.

My homelab got an upgrade – Intel Optane SSDs!

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I didn’t blog about it until yet because I didn’t have the time to install, test and troubleshoot. Also, I didn’t have much time for writing because I was busy with private and business things. But just recently I found time to do some homelabbing and test some things.

May I introduce you: Intel Optane SSDs!

A while ago, the vExpert community got the opportunity to apply for Intel Optane SSDs. I thought why not? They can always say no. So I applied for three Intel Optane SSDs. And I was one of the chosen ones. Sure, this sounds cheesy, but I don’t know how many vExperts finally got some disks.

Through the vExpert program, we had the possibility to choose between the 2.5″ U.2 P4800X 375 GB SSD or its PCIe counterpart. I applied for the U.2 disk. If only I had known what I was getting myself into…

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