Convert a NetApp CIFS share to VHD or VHDX

[hseebacher]

Hi,

I want to move the whole content from a netapp CIFS share to a VHD file.

Is there any fast way to just 'package' or convert the CIFS share into a VHD file?

The reason is:

Veeam can't Backup the CIFS share.

Robocopying a CIFS share of some TB data to VHD would take about a day or longer.

Also i would need some extra TB of space while doing this. (if its 10 TB i would need another 10 TB to do the copy job - so before i delete the CIFS share i'd need 20 TB)

I don't know very much about the VHD File system..

Thanks in advance to anyone who has an idea 🙂

[bingen]

The only way I could think of to do this off hand (and I'm not an authority by any stretch), would be to create a VHDX in the share, mount the VHDX, then utilize ODX to copy/move the data into the new VHDX.

Utilizing ODX will leverage native cloning technology in the volume so copy will be very fast, and it will not require space overhead since the files will already be deduplicated.

You could also do it with a LUN since we support NAS to SAN ODX.

The ConvertTo-NcLun and ConvertTo-NcVhdx Cmdlets will allow you to convert your LUN or VHDX back and forth to either format once you get there.

Does your backup application support NDMP? That might be another option to look at.

[aborzenkov]

---

You could also do it with a LUN since we support NAS to SAN ODX.

---

Wow! Could you share link to Microsoft description of this feature? Thank you!

[bingen]

NetApp covers it pretty extensively in the SAN admin guide starting on page 128

https://library.netapp.com/ecm/ecm_download_file/ECMP1636035

Remember, because dedup happens at the volume level, if you want to make use of the native block cloning technology during the offloaded copy, then you'll need to create your LUN in the same volume.

[hseebacher]

Thanks for you advices. I think Veeam doesnt support NDMP yet.

https://www.veeam.com/blog/veeam-to-offer-advanced-data-protection-with-netapp.html

Will read some information about ODX now 🙂