Feature Request - Disk Resizing

[Stewart]

Hi All

A new feature I would like to see within Veeam. Please show your support!

The scenario:
A VM was created with disks that are too large. C: of 200GB, D: of 500GB for example
There is a large amount of free space within the OS of the VM - 60% free on C:, 80% free on D:

The VM is to be replicated to a new site and the disks are to be re-sized to free up unused space. Currently the only method to do this is VBR and then use VMware Converter to re-size the disks after failover (AFAIK).

It would be really helpful to be able to re-size the disks during the replication stage. For example the _replica VM only has C: drive of 100GB and D: drive of 120GB. When failover is complete the new _replica VM already has reduced disk sizes without the need to resize using VMware Converter...

Please let me know what you think!

[Shestakov]

Hi Stuart,
Do you want to resize disk on both source and target hosts or only on the target one?
What if the source VM disks grow bigger than target VM disks?
By the way, there is an option to choose disk provisioning for the replica VMs. Does thin provisioning work for you?
Thanks!

[Stewart]

Hi

Just on the target hosts.

We do not like thin provisioning here. VMs have a habit of growing and filling up space on volumes creating more of an issue unless the datastores are managed very closely.

[Shestakov]

Thanks for the reply.
And how would you like the logic to work if source VM`s size is growing bigger than the size of the target disks?

[Stewart]

Hi Shestakov

If the source disk to be re-sized is only removing free space, I don't see how the source VM would grow bigger than the size of the target disks...

[Shestakov]

Let`s consider the scenario you described above:
You have a VM with 2 thick disks C: 200GB D: 500GB while used space is C: 100GB D: 120GB
You don`t like the option to create thin disks for replica_VM on target, but you want the target VM to take as much space as its primary VM takes (220GB).
When you perform a failover, replica VM becomes production one and can start growing, so you can`t restrict its size.

Looks like your case can be easily solved with thin disks on the secondary(replica) site. Just set the max. amount of space it can take and VM will not eat all the datastore`s space.
Thanks!

[Stewart]

But then the OS within the VM still reports C: 200GB and D:500GB...

Never mind, it was only an idea that would have saved me time...

[Shestakov]

Yes it does. You can decrease provisioned space once failover is done.
Thanks for the request anyway.

[Stewart]

And that was the point of the request, to reduce the "provisioned space" as you put it, as part of the replication.

The only other way to do this is to replicate and then run VMware converter once the failover is done. A 2 step process. It would be really good if it could be done as a single step process.