Decommissioning old virtuals....

[R.O.S.S.I]

Hi all, we had a big virtualisation project not long ago turning everything we had into virtual servers but at the same time creating new servers to replace them.

Now at the moment we've got several servers on our ESX host, and i've had 2 of them turned off for a good 3-4 months. One is our old Exchange 2007 box (as we've gone up to 2010 now), and the other is our old file-server and domain controller (these have now been split onto 2 new separate VM's).

Is it just as simple as scrapping the VM's in the vSphere Client? Or is there a standard decommissioning process to follow? My understanding is that if these machines have been off for the past 3-4 months then they obviously aren't (and can't) being used in our infrastructure.

The only time I had to turn one of them on was when I had an issue with some people logging on with roaming profiles and it couldn't copy their profile from the old server to the new one. That was resolved quickly just by turning the machine on and letting it copy them across, and its been turned off straight after.

So my question is - Do I delete the VM's that have been off for a few months? Or is there a more standard procedure to take with this sort of thing?

 

[R.O.S.S.I]

for domain controller,you would have to dcpromo (to demote it from a DC to file server)

If a domain controller hasnt been on for ages, it will be tombstoned (default 60days)

though you can google instructions in order to remove the domain controller without powering on the server (so it removes all reference from AD)

The old DC was dcpromo'd and demoted then the new one was brought online. The old server doesnt have that role on it anymore so would it still be an issue? It's literally just an old file server now.

 

[R.O.S.S.I]

Well if it's power off in the VM I would have thought you would have had issues by now.

Exactly, so am I right in thinking I can just delete the VM's?

Like I said, one is an old Exchange 2007 box, and the other is now basically just the old file server.

I just thought there might have been other things to take into consideration.

 

[R.O.S.S.I]

Ill boot them up with no NIC's enabled tomorrow and remove the Exchange software off it itself as per MS's guidance, then I'll the remove all the roles and features installed on them so they're as back to scratch as possible!

Then i'll bin them!