Exchange 2010 on VMware - can I expand a partition with databases on it?

I have an Exchange server at a remote office that has a database partition that has grown considerably. It is running on VMWare vsphere 4.1.

Normally on most VMs I would shut down the VM, and increase the disk space, then expand the disk.

But the question is...can I do this with a partition that has Exchange MDB files on it (safely)?

Solution 1:

Yes, you can do this on the fly...

Let's assume your Exchange DB is on a dedicated partition... (if Exchange is on C:, there's a different approach that will require downtime)

You can expand the volume size from the vSphere client. That additional space will be recognized immediately in the Windows Server Manager... Server Manager -> Storage -> Disk Management

Grow your volume from that point using the unused space.

I've done this live on Exchange log and database volumes (oops).