#Connect usb backup drive to esxi how to#
#Connect usb backup drive to esxi driver#

Plug in the USB device to your ESXi host.

(optional) Use this command to permanently disable the USBВ arbitrator service after reboot.

(When disabling it, you can no longer passthrough USB devices to VMs) ~ # /etc/init.d/usbarbitrator stop This service is used toВ passthrough USB device from an ESX/ESXi host to a virtual machine. Create VMFS5/6 Datastore on USB drivesД¬reating VMFS5 or VMFS6 datastores works just as in previous versions: The datastore should now show up within /vmfs/volumes and the Embedded Host Client. Use the VMFS UUID to mount the datastore: # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot mount -u 583b1a72-ade01532-55f6-f44d30649051 Get a list of VMFS snapshots with ESXCLI: # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot list I don't know why and I've only seen this in ESXi 6.5 but it's very easy to fix.

The datastore obviously gets detected as snapshot. You can see the device in /dev/disks but the datastore remains offline. Existing Datastores are not mounted automaticallyДЄ common problem which I've heard multiple times, but only seen since ESXi 6.5, is that when you connect a flash drive that already contains a VMFS datastore, the datastore does not show up. You can still partition and format USB devices with VMFS like in previous versions, just use the new name. The new naming does not have an impact on USB datastores, despite it might happen that you overlook the USB device when checking the /dev/disks/ directory. My 16GB flash drives shows up with the oldВ mpx.vmhba naming on both versions: # ESXi 6.0u2 Here is an example of a Samsung M.2 flash drive connected with a USB3 adapter: # ESXi 6.0u2 In ESXi 6.0, all USB devices are recognizedВ as mpx.vmhbaXX while in 6.5 some are listed as naa.XXX. Which I noticed first was that the devices naming in 6.5 have been changed. Please remember that using USB Datastores is not supported by VMware so if you have problems, do not open service requests for that.

#Connect usb backup drive to esxi how to#

This post explains the changes in the new version and how to create VMFS 5 or VMFS6 formatted USB devices as datastore on your ESXi host. I've tried to reproduce and fix those problems. Some people have reported that they have issues with USB Datastores since ESXi 6.5.

#Connect usb backup drive to esxi driver#

The new driver has some implications if you are trying to use USB devices like USB sticks or external hard disks as VMFS formatted datastore. The legacy drivers, including xhci, ehci-hcd, usb-uhci, and usb-storage have been replaced with a single USB driver named vmkusb. In ESXi 6.5, there are some changes concerning devices connected with USB.