Mount Vmfs 6 Windows Hot

Solution: Even in read-only, the driver may read the lock file (/.vSphere-HA-lock). Disable “Use atomic locking” in your VMFS driver settings (if available). StarWind and UFS Explorer ignore these locks in read-only mode.

If you don't want to pay for software and have a spare machine (or can boot from a USB stick on your Windows hardware), this is the most robust method. Since Windows can't read VMFS, we bypass Windows entirely.

The Workflow:

Result: You can browse all VM folders, copy .vmdk, .vmx, and .vswp files to a healthy NTFS drive.

The most reliable free tool for this specific task is Open VMFS (formerly associated with Veaam, now an open-source project). mount vmfs 6 windows hot

Tool: Open VMFS or specific forks like vmfs6-tools wrapped in a UI. However, for Windows users, the easiest interface is often a tool like Veaam File Manager (for older VMFS) or a compiled binary of vmfs-tools.

Current Best Practice for Windows: Because VMFS6 uses a different hashing structure than VMFS5, many older Windows GUI tools (like the old VMFS Driver) fail. Solution: Even in read-only, the driver may read

If the server is still running ("Hot") and you just need to access files, do not try to mount the datastore on Windows. Instead, access the datastore from ESXi. Use Open VMFS (Console/GUI):