Does quick migration utilise cross vcenter vmotion?

[Jimbo81]

Hi everyone, we are looking at migrating from a vcenter cluster with vSAN to a new cluster with SAN.
Usually I would have a swing host and utilise vmotion but this host wouldn't be able to see the vSAN

I had the idea to use Veeam Quick Migration with vMotion and was wondering if anyone has had experience using this to migrate between two separate vCenter clusters where neither can see the others storage?
Do we just need to configure a shared vMotion network and then Quick migration will use Cross vCenter vMotion?

Or will this still shut down the source VM resulting in downtime?

Thanks.

[Mildur]

Hi James

No, Veeam's own data transport engine is used. It will be a cold migration with a reboot.

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=120

ColdMigration
With ColdMigration, Veeam Backup & Replication stops the VM, then copies changes made to the VM disk after snapshot creation to the new host. After, the VM is started on the target host.

Best,
Fabian

[Jimbo81]

I've performed several quick migrations with the vmotion networks linked between old and new clusters, I can confirm it uses vmotion and there is zero downtime.

Virtual machines with 4GB, 8GB and 32GB of vRAM, the VM was never shutdown and came up just like it would with a normal vMotion.
Clearly Quick migration switches over to vMotion fully and then addresses the VM id changing, or changes the VM id on the new VM to maintain backup chains.

[Mildur]

Hi James

Thanks.
I‘ll check again. Maybe a prerequisite is missing in my lab.

Best,
Fabian

[Jimbo81]

Thanks Fabian, for reference both vCenters are on v7 and both support cross vCenter vMotion.
Both clusters are visible to Veeam and the vMotion networks of both are on the same VLAN.
Another thing to note is VMs will switch to quickswitch mode if an ISO is mapped, whether connected or not, I confirmed that this will also stop a normal cross vCenter vMotion from occuring.

We've moved multiple VM's today using quick migration, it runs the migration with vMotion and there is no loss of service, it also updates the VM id at the end so backup chains are not broken.
Very cool!

[VBR_Eng]

I've performed several quick migrations with the vmotion networks linked between old and new clusters, I can confirm it uses vmotion and there is zero downtime.

Virtual machines with 4GB, 8GB and 32GB of vRAM, the VM was never shutdown and came up just like it would with a normal vMotion.
Clearly Quick migration switches over to vMotion fully and then addresses the VM id changing, or changes the VM id on the new VM to maintain backup chains.

You mean that you succeeded to migrate VMs from vSAN environment to another vSAN environment?

[Mildur]

Hi @Jimbo81

There was a misunderstanding on my side.
Thank you for testing and sharing your experience with the community.

Best,
Fabian