How to remove a disk from a vSAN disk group/host

Products

• VMware vSAN

Issue/Introduction

• This article provides steps to safely remove a disk from a vSAN disk group.
• vSAN disk reports as failed
• Disk groups need to be resized to meet the company's needs
• Capacity disk not showing at the time of creation of Disk group.

Environment

VMware vSAN (All OSA Versions)

Resolution

1. Confirm if Deduplication and Compression is in use or not
2. Place the host into maintenance mode with Ensure Accessibility
   
   
3. If dedup is not in use, then go to vSAN Cluster > Configure > Disk Management > Select the disk to be removed > Confirm no data impact with the Pre-Check Data Migration > If no data impact, then select Remove Disk(s)
   
   
4. If deduplication is enabled, the entire disk group must be removed and recreated. vSAN Cluster > Configure > Disk Management > Select the disk group to be removed > Confirm no data impact with the Pre-Check Data Migration > If no data impact then select Remove Disk Group
   
   
5. From the ESXi command line, follow KB How to manually remove and recreate a vSAN disk group using esxcli
   
   If the physical disk was removed from the host before removing the disk/disk group via vCenter Web Client, follow the above KB to remove the disk/disk group via the ESXi CLI.
   
   If the disk or disk group cannot be removed for any reason, open a case with vSAN support for further assistance.
   
   

Additional Information

Remove Disk Groups or Devices from vSAN
Adding or Removing Disks with Deduplication and Compression Enabled

Impact/Risks:

• The disk or disk group must be removed via the vCenter Web Client before removing the physical disk from the host; otherwise, the removal process will fail.
• Removing a disk can cause a PSOD or render the host unresponsive if not done properly.
• It is also advisable to maintain a current backup of all data residing on the vSAN datastore.
• The disk may return after a reboot and may work normally again in some cases; however, it is advisable to perform a health check at regular intervals to ensure the disk is functioning as intended and not due to an issue.