Converting VMware Virtual Machines to Hyper-V using VMM 2008 V2V

VMware based virtual machines can be converted to run with the Microsoft Hyper-V and Virtual Server environments using the Virtual to Virtual (V2V) feature of Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) 2008. Virtual machines created using VMware Server, VMware Workstation and VMware ESX can be converted to Hyper-V.

Unlike the VMM 2008 Physical to Virtual (P2V) conversion process covered in the Performing Physical to Virtual (P2V) Conversions using VMM 2008 chapter, the V2V conversion cannot be performed on a running virtual machine instance. Instead, the V2V conversion process involves shutting down the virtual machine and importing the VMware virtual disk (.vmdk) and configuration file (.vmx) into the VMM 2008 library prior to performing the conversion. If a conversion that does not involve shutting down the source system is required, a P2V online conversion can be performed, simply treating the virtual machine as a physical system.

Once the VMware virtual machine files have been placed in a VMM Library, the conversion process converts the VMware .vmdk virtual disk file to a virtual hard disk (.vhd) file and reproduces the virtual machine hardware settings within the Hyper-V or virtual server environment.

A VMM 2008 V2V conversion can be performed on virtual machines running the following guest operating systems:

• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit)

• Windows Server 2008 (64-bit)

• Windows 2000 Server SP4 or later

• Windows 2000 Advanced Server SP4 or later

• Windows XP Professional (32-bit) SP2 or later

• Windows XP Professional (64-bit) SP2 or later

• Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (32-bit)

• Windows Vista SP1 or later (64-bit)

A VMM Library is essentially a network share folder in which files are stored. The default location for the VMM Library share on a VMM Library server is named MSSCVMMLibrary which may be located by selecting Network from the Windows Start menu and navigating to the appropriate server. To add the VMware .vmdk disk and .vmx configuration files to the library simply copy them into the library share folder of the library server. Once the files have been copied it may be necessary to refresh the library before the files will be added to the library catalog. To achieve this, start the VMM Administrator Console (for details refer to the chapter entitled A Guided Tour of the VMM Administrator Console) and select the Library view from the pane located in the bottom left hand corner of the window. From the Library view, right click on the library to which the files were added from the list in the top right hand pane and select Refresh. Once the refresh has been performed the files will be visible in the library and ready to be converted.