You can use a third-party product to restore a vCenter Server environment.

Important: You can back up and restore only virtual machines that contain vCenter Server instances. You cannot back up and restore physical machines that are running vCenter Server by using a third-party product.

Procedure

  1. Restore the vCenter Server virtual machine onto the ESXi host using a third-party solution.
  2. Use the service-control --status --all command to verify that the services have started.
    Wait for all the vCenter Server services to start, which can take several minutes.
  3. Launch the vCenter Server Management Interface, https://appliance-IP-address-or-FQDN:5480.
  4. When you launch the vCenter Server Management Interface, based on the change in the vCenter Server appliance data you will see one of the following:
    1. If there is a change in the vCenter Server appliance data that needs to be synchronized, reconciliation window will be displayed. Follow the prompts to complete the reconcilation and then provide the Single Sign-On credentials to log into the vCenter Server Management Interface.
    2. If there is no change in the vCenter Server appliance data, the vCenter Server Management Interface login screen will be displayed.

What to do next

Power on the restored virtual machine that contains the restored vCenter Server instance.