Transfer ZS to new hardware preserving configuration

[cdpearce]

I have a system that is outgrowing itself and may need to be moved to new hardware. I’m hoping there will be a way to move the extensive configuration from the current system to the next. I imagine the new system will number its ethernet ports differently, and I may want to separate out some VLANs that currently share a single port into separate ports. So, the mapping between ETH numbers and VLANs is going to change.

I don’t mind re-creating a lot of the configuration, but I really don’t want to type in all the DHCP and DNS configuration all over again. So, how can I transfer it from one system to the next?

a) Backup one system and restore on the other
Will this work with changing hardware configuration and ETH numbering? Will I be able to recover the DNS and DHCP configurations? In particular, DHCP is aware of the ETH numbers, will it do the right thing?

b) Export/Import configurations
Is there a way to export, edit if necessary, and re-import configuration elements? e.g. DHCP, DNS tables?
If it involves export/import from LDAP, can this be done? How? I’m not familiar with LDAP tools.

[DrmCa]

I did migrate from one hardware configuration to another in the past. My systems were initially Dell P4 Celeron machine with an Intel WAN NIC and 2x 3Com LAN LAN NICs. Then I went to an AMD Duron system with an on-board Realtek WAN and the same 3Com LAN NICs. And from there I migrated to an HP Atom micro-ATX PC with an Intel LAN NIC and onboard Realtec WAN.

Every time I backed up and restored the configuration. I did have to re-assign interfaces and that was it.

[Author]

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