How to transfer esxi 6.0 system from USB to HDD?

Question

VMware

Good afternoon,

I would like to migrate an Esxi 6.0 system from USB to HDD on an HP Microserver Gen8 server. Home server, operating system Free version.

The server has 4 disks, which are combined into 2 RAIDs. All virtual machines are installed on one, there is enough free space. On the other, nothing is installed - it is used as storage.

It is necessary (my assumptions):
1. Save somehow a copy (as a backup) of all virtual machines from the first disk (can I just make a copy of the directories?)
2. Reduce the size of the partition on the disk to free up the system (as I understand it 16Gb maybe enough?)
3. Add a new partition and install a new system (6.2?) on it or copy the current one from USB somehow
4. Make the new partition bootable
5. Remove the inserted USB from the internal connector, making it possible to boot from the new partition

. I wanted to ask what are the best programs, ways to do these steps. At least just in general terms, I'll google the rest. Unfortunately, I have no serious experience with ESXi and how best to do it.

Thanks for the advice
Dmitry

Answer 1

If there is nothing specific in the settings - do not fool around with transferring from a USB disk to an HDD.
1. Transfer all VMs from the first disk to the second (you can simply copy the directories)
2. Boot from the installation flash drive and install a clean, updated system on the "first disk" (it will take as much as it needs. The rest will remain under the datastore).
3. You can return to your place the virtual machines placed on the second disk.