StarWind Software

Currently we are running ESXi 5.5 on a single host, in the effort to have HA and DR a new host was purchase.

The plan is to have a 2 node cluster running Hyper-V. However we need to migrate the old VMs from ESXi before reformating the old host.

Are the following step feasible to migrate from ESXi to Hyper-V?
The new host will have the OS installed on a 32GB SD card running Win 2012 R2 (core Edition), local storage will be equally partitioned at 1TB in Raid 5.
Migrate existing VMs from ESXi to Hyper-V.
The old host will be have the OS installed on a 32GB SD card running Win 2012 R2 (core Edition), local storage will be equally partitioned at 1TB in Raid 5.
Install SolarWind Virtual San on both host, create a SAN from both hosts with the secondary partition.
Join both hosts into a cluster, move existing VMs into the cluster.
Create a new SAN from both hosts with the primary partition.

RAID5 is a bad thing for image files but is OK for LSFS (LSFS can mitigate read-modify-write write penalty of parity RAID while image file currently cannot).

We're StarWind (SAN Provider), SolarWinds are another company (SAN Mgmt).

You can use something like VEEAM backup to take a copy of your VMs on other destination. Then you mount backup datastore with Windows, convert VMs from ESXi -> Hyper-V using our converter tool (unlike others we can patch hardware to match new emulated hardware set) and import them in Hyper-V. After that you're GOOD

sorry for the typo

what would you recommend in term of raid that is best suited for image files?

also would the steps mentioned above be feasible or should i do a different back up and setup strategy?

Hello Lucki!

We recommend using RAID 10.

Yes, all steps mentioned above are feasible. But again, i would recommend using RAID 10, if it is possible.

Let me know if you have any questions left, thank you.