You can use the vCenter Server appliance GUI installer to restore a vCenter Server to an ESXi host or a vCenter Server instance. The restore procedure has two stages. The first stage deploys a new vCenter Server appliance. The second stage populates the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance with the data stored in the file-based backup.

Figure 1. vCenter Server Restore Workflow
Restore workflow

Prerequisites

  • Verify that your system meets the minimum software and hardware requirements. See System Requirements for the vCenter Server Appliance.
  • If the vCenter Server instance is part of a vCenter High Availability cluster, you must power off the active, passive, and witness nodes of the cluster before restoring the vCenter Server.

Stage 1 - Deploy a New Appliance

In stage 1 of the restore process, you deploy the OVA file, which is included in the vCenter Server GUI installer.

As an alternative to performing the first stage of the restore with the GUI installer, you can deploy the OVA file of the new vCenter Server appliance by using the vSphere Client. After the OVA deployment, you must log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface of the newly deployed appliance to proceed with the second stage of the restore process. See "Deploy an OVF or OVA Template" in vSphere Virtual Machine Administration vSphere Virtual Machine Administration for information about deploying an OVA file using the vSphere Client.

Prerequisites

  • Download and mount the vCenter Server installer. See Download and Mount the vCenter Server Installer.
    Note: If you are restoring a backup from a product that has a vCenter Server product patch applied, you must download the full ISO of that particular patch. See Download VMware vSphere.
  • If you plan to restore the vCenter Server on an ESXi host, verify that the target ESXi host is not in lockdown or maintenance mode or part of a fully-automated DRS cluster.
  • If you plan to restore the vCenter Server on a DRS cluster of a vCenter Server inventory, verify that the cluster contains at least one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
  • If you plan to assign a static IP address to the appliance, verify that you have configured the forward and reverse DNS records for the IP address.
  • If you are attempting to restore a vCenter Server instance that is still running, power off the backed up vCenter Server before you start the restore operation.

Procedure

  1. In the vCenter Server installer, navigate to the vcsa-ui-installer directory, go to the subdirectory for your operating system, and run the installer executable file.
    • For Windows OS, go to the win32 subdirectory, and run the installer.exe file.
    • For Linux OS, go to the lin64 subdirectory, and run the installer file.
    • For Mac OS, go to the mac subdirectory, and run the Installer.app file.
  2. On the Home page, click Restore.
  3. Review the Introduction page to understand the restore process and click Next.
  4. Read and accept the license agreement, and click Next.
  5. On the Enter backup details page, enter the details of the backup file that you want to restore, and click Next.
    Option Description
    Backup location Enter the server address and backup folder where the backup files are stored. You can also enter the IP address or hostname of the backup server and browse for the location of the backup folder. Specify the protocol to use to retrieve the backup from your backup server. You can select FTP, FTPS, HTTP, HTTPS, SFTP, NFS, or SMB. For example, 
    ftp://<server_IP_address>/tmp/vCenter/hostname_vcenter.com/<backup_filename>
    User name Enter the user name of a user with read privileges on the backup server.
    Password Enter the password of the user with read privileges on the backup server.
  6. Review the backup information, and click Next.
  7. Connect to the ESXi host or vCenter Server on which you want to deploy the vCenter Server appliance to use for the restore operation.
    Option Steps
    You can connect to an ESXi host on which to deploy the appliance to use for the restore operation.
    1. Enter the FQDN or IP address of the ESXi host.
    2. Enter the HTTPS port of the ESXi host.
    3. Enter the user name and password of a user with administrative privileges on the ESXi host, for example, the root user.
    4. Click Next.
    5. Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprint of the SSL certificate that is installed on the target ESXi host, and click Yes to accept the certificate thumbprint.
    You can connect to a vCenter Server instance and browse the inventory to select an ESXi host or DRS cluster on which to deploy the appliance to use for the restore operation.
    1. Enter the FQDN or IP address of the vCenter Server instance.
    2. Enter the HTTPS port of the vCenter Server instance.
    3. Enter the user name and password of user with vCenter Single Sign-On administrative privileges on the vCenter Server instance, for example, the administrator@your_domain_name user.
    4. Click Next.
    5. Verify that the certificate warning displays the SHA1 thumbprint of the SSL certificate that is installed on the target vCenter Server instance, and click Yes to accept the certificate thumbprint.
    6. Select the data center or data center folder that contains the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the appliance, and click Next.
      Note: You must select a data center or data center folder that contains at least one ESXi host that is not in lockdown or maintenance mode.
    7. Select the ESXi host or DRS cluster on which you want to deploy the appliance, and click Next.
  8. Accept the certificate warning.
  9. Enter a name for the vCenter Server appliance, set up the password for the root user, and click Next.
  10. Select the deployment size for the new vCenter Server appliance depending on the size of your vSphere inventory.
    Deployment Size Option Description
    Tiny Deploys an appliance with 2 vCPUs and 14 GB of memory.

    Suitable for environments with up to 10 hosts or 100 virtual machines

    Small Deploys an appliance with 4 vCPUs and 21 GB of memory.

    Suitable for environments with up to 100 hosts or 1,000 virtual machines

    Medium Deploys an appliance with 8 vCPUs and 30 GB of memory.

    Suitable for environments with up to 400 hosts or 4,000 virtual machines

    Large Deploys an appliance with 16 vCPUs and 39 GB of memory.

    Suitable for environments with up to 1,000 hosts or 10,000 virtual machines

    X-Large Deploys an appliance with 24 vCPUs and 58 GB of memory.

    Suitable for environments with up to 2,500 hosts or 45,000 virtual machines

  11. Select the storage size for the new vCenter Server appliance, and click Next.
    Important: You must consider the storage size of the appliance that you are restoring.
    Storage Size Option Description for Tiny Deployment Size Description for Small Deployment Size Description for Medium Deployment Size Description for Large Deployment Size Description for X-Large Deployment Size
    Default Deploys an appliance with 579 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 694 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 908 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 1358 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 2283 GB of storage.
    Large Deploys an appliance with 2019 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 2044 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 2208 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 2258 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 2383 GB of storage.
    X-Large Deploys an appliance with 4279 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 4304 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 4468 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 4518 GB of storage. Deploys an appliance with 4643 GB of storage.
  12. From the list of available datastores, select the location where all the virtual machine configuration files and virtual disks will be stored and, optionally, enable thin provisioning by selecting Enable Thin Disk Mode.
  13. On the Configure network settings page review the settings populated from the backup file of the vCenter Server.
  14. (Optional) Edit the network configuration to match the current network environment where the vCenter Server is restored.
  15. On the Ready to complete stage 1 page, review the deployment settings for the restored vCenter Server appliance and click Finish to start the OVA deployment process.
  16. Wait for the OVA deployment to finish, and click Continue to proceed with stage 2 of the restore process to transfer the data to the newly deployed appliance.
    Note: If you exit the wizard by clicking Close, you must log in to the vCenter Server Management Interface to transfer the data.

Results

The newly deployed vCenter Server appliance is running on the target server but the data is not copied from the backup location.

Stage 2 - Transfer Data to the Newly Deployed Appliance

After the OVA deployment finishes, you are redirected to stage 2 of the restore process in which the data from the backup location is copied to the newly deployed vCenter Server appliance.

Procedure

  1. Review the introduction to stage 2 of the restore process and click Next.
  2. Review the backup details and click Next.
  3. If you are restoring a node with enhanced linked mode support for vCenter Server appliance, you are asked to provide the Single Sign-On credentials. Enter the Single Sign-On user name and password, then click Validate and Recover.
  4. On the Ready to complete page, review the details, click Finish, and click OK to complete stage 2 of the restore process.
    The restore process restarts the vCenter Server Management Service. You cannot access the vCenter Server Management API during the restart.
    Important: If a restore operation of a vCenter Server appliance VM results with a failure, you must power off and delete the partially restored VM. After that you can try to restore the VM again.
  5. (Optional) After the restore process finishes, click the https://vcenter_server_appliance_fqdn/ui to go to the vSphere Client and log in to the vCenter Server instance , or click the https://vcenter_server_appliance_fqdn:443 to go to the vCenter Server Getting Started page.
  6. Click Close to exit the wizard.
    You are redirected to the vCenter Server Getting Started page.
  7. If the backed up vCenter node is part of a vCenter High Availability cluster, the last needs to be reconfigured after the restore operation completes successfully.
    For information about how to perform backup and restore operations, see vSphere Availability.

What to do next

After successful completion of the restore operation, in the event of a total loss of all storage and servers where all the physical hardware or the data in the hardware is lost, follow the instructions in the VMware knowledge base article at http://kb.vmware.com/kb/76585 in order to recover the system to a pre-restore state at the time of the backup.