Migrating from VMWARE to VirtualBox

Question

I m trying to migrate an existing VM from VMWARE to VirtualBox  I ve made a copy of the Virtual Machine folder for the VM  so I can experiment and not destroy the original  and have successfully created a VM in VirtualBox  I ve got everything booting and running  but the issue is that VM is using the  flat  disk image instead of the correct disk image causing the disk image to be from the past  I know this because all the files on the machine have a timestamp of 2009    To elaborate  in the VM s folder i have the following vmdk files   Win2003 vmdk  1 K  Win2003-flat vmdk  15 gigs  Win2003-000002 vmdk  10 gigs    NOTE  the disk is dynamic   Looking in the configuration of the VM under VMWARE  it says that it s using the win2003-000002 vmdk as the disk image   When I import the disk image into VirtualBox  the Win2003 vmdk file   it uses the Win2003-flat vmdk disk image   My question is  what can I do to either combine or import the Win2003-000002 vmdk disk image into the Win2003-flat vmdk disk image so that VirtualBox will use the correct disk image   I ve some instructions on using vmware-vdiskmanager exe to accomplish this  but I get an error stating  The parent of this virtual disk could not be opened

User · Answer

QEMU has a fantastic utility called qmeu-img that will translate between all manner of disk image formats. An article on this process is at http://thedarkmaster.wordpress.com/2007/03/12/vmware-virtual-machine-to-virtual-box-conversion-how-to/

I recall in my head that I used qemu-img to roll multiple VMDKs into one, but I don't have that computer with me to retest the process. Even if I'm wrong, the article above includes a section that describes how to convert them with your VMWare tools.

User · Answer

After many attempts I was finally able to get this working  Essentially what I did was download and use the vmware converter to merge the two disks into one  After that I was able to attach the newly created disk to VitrualBox   The steps involved are very simple   BEFORE YOU DO ANYTHING   1  MAKE A BACKUP    Even if you follow these instruction  you could screw things up  so make a backup  Just shutdown the VM and then make a copy of the directory where VM resides   2  Uninstall VMware Tools from the VM that you are going to convert  If for some reason you forget this step  you can still uninstall it after getting everything running under VirtualBox by following these steps  Do yourself the favor and just do it now   NOW THE FUN PART     1  Download and install the VMware Converter  I used 5 0 1 build-875114  just use the latest   2  Download and install VirtualBox  3  Fire up VMWare convertor     4  Click on Convert machine  6  Browse to the  vmx for your VM and click Next     7  Give the new VM a name and select the location where you want to put it  Click Next    8  Click Next on the Options screen  You shouldn t have to change anything here     9  Click Finish on the Summary screen to begin the conversion     10  The conversion should start  This will take a LOOONG time so be patient     11  Hopefully all went well  if it did  you should see that the conversion is completed     12  Now open up VirtualBox and click New     13  Give your VM a name and select what Type and Version it is  Click Next     14  Select the size of the memory you want to give it  Click Next     15  For the Hard Drive  click Use and existing hard drive file and select the newly converted  vmdk file     16  Now Click Settings and select the Storage menu  The issue is that by default VirtualBox will add the drive as an IDE  This won t work and we need as we need to put it on a SCSI controller      17  Select the IDE controller and the Remove Controller button     18  Now click the Add Controller button and select Add SCSI Controller    19  Click the Add Hard Disk button     20  Click Choose existing disk    21  Select your  vmdk file  Click OK    22  Select the System menu     23  Click Enable IO APIC  Then click OK    24  Congrats    Your VM is now confgiured  Click Start to startup the VM

User · Answer

This error occurs because VMware has a bug that uses the absolute path of the disk file in certain situations    If you look at the top of that small   vmdk file you ll likely see an incorrect absolute path to the original VMDK file that needs to be corrected

User · Answer

I will suggest something totally different  we used it at work for many years ago on real computers and it worked perfect   Boot both old and new machine on linux rescue Cd   read the disk from one  and write it down to the other one  block by block  effectively copying the dist over the network   You have to play around a little bit with the command line  but it worked so well that both machine complained about IP-conflict when they both booted  -   -   cat  dev sda   ssh user othermachine cat -  gt   dev sda

User · Answer

Note  I am not sure this will be of any help to you  but you never know   I found this link http   www ubuntugeek com howto-convert-vmware-image-to-virtualbox-image html  ENJOY  -

[vmware] Migrating from VMWARE to VirtualBox

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