Removing Snapshots and
Deleting Linked Virtual Machines
After you have created a group of linked
virtual machines, you can remove a snapshot that was the basis for a linked
virtual machine, or delete a virtual machine. Those actions affect disks in the
linked virtual machine group. Perform the actions when connected to a vCenter
Server system for disk consolidation or deletion.
- Snapshot removal – During snapshot removal, the snapshot metadata is also removed, and the virtual machine from which the snapshot was taken is no longer shown as having snapshots. If you remove a snapshot while connected to the ESXi host directly, shared disks are not consolidated and unnecessary levels of delta disks might result. If you remove a snapshot while connected to a vCenter Server system, shared disks are not consolidated, but unshared disks are consolidated.
- Virtual machine deletion – When you delete a virtual machine by directly connecting to the ESXi host, shared disks are not deleted. When you delete a virtual machine by connecting to a vCenter Server system, shared disks are not deleted, but unshared disks are deleted.Delete all linked virtual machines before deleting the source virtual machine from which they were created, so that you don’t have orphaned or corrupt disk files on your file system.