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4 Replies Last post: Nov 10, 2009 8:39 PM by BenConrad  

Any known issues when P2V'ing specific Enterprise servers? posted: Oct 26, 2009 10:57 PM

Click to view buddybergman's profile Lurker
buddybergman
2 posts since
Oct 25, 2009
We are working on a large scale virtualization project and have a list of various servers that we are researching any known issues that may happen during or after a P2V process (if they are even capable of being virtualized). If anyone would have any advice or experience working with anything in this list it would be appreciated if you could share your experience.


IBM Tivoli Gateway

IBM Site Protector

Symantec Antivirus Enterprise server

McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator (EPO) server

McAfee EPO SADR

McAfee EPO Database

McAfee SmartFilter

McAfee Hercules Remediation Manager

Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) Site Server

Microsoft SCCM Reporting Point

Microsoft SCCM Management Point

Microsoft SCCM Distribution Point

Crystal Reports Server

Adobe Connect

ArcGIS Web Mapping Server

Sun OCSP

Sun DNS server

Sun DMR Management Server

Sun MySQL Database server

Sun Spectrum

Thanks for any assistance as we do our research.

Cheers.

-Buddy

Re: Any known issues when P2V'ing specific Enterprise servers?

1. Oct 27, 2009 3:07 AM in response to: buddybergman
Click to view TobiasKracht's profile Expert
TobiasKracht
508 posts since
Aug 31, 2009
Try to make P2V and than test it for some time, it`s best option to find any possible bugs in your configuration.

StarWind Software R&D
http://www.starwindsoftware.com

Re: Any known issues when P2V'ing specific Enterprise servers?

2. Oct 28, 2009 10:01 PM in response to: TobiasKracht
Click to view buddybergman's profile Lurker
buddybergman
2 posts since
Oct 25, 2009

Yes that is an ideal situation but this project we are doing puts us under a very tight timeline and doesn't allow us to have any burn-in period for bug checking except while it's already in a live state as a VM. So that's why we are researching and preparing as much as possible ahead of time.

I should elaborate on some information. We are going to be using VMware ESX 3.5 and will also be using Mobile Virtualization Units to P2V servers that are not already part of the datacenter and are not on a 1GB link or better. I'm working to contact each application vendor directly for virtualization recommendations of their products, but any real world experience of issues or fopaux's are also being saught after to help us out.

Cheers.

Re: Any known issues when P2V'ing specific Enterprise servers?

3. Nov 5, 2009 10:23 AM in response to: buddybergman
Click to view Texiwill's profile Guru
Texiwill
10,205 posts since
Jan 13, 2004
Hello,

Moved to the Enterprise Strategy forum. I have not heard of any issues, but be sure your P2V strategy will account for unknown devices and drivers within the newly migrated VMs.


Best regards,
Edward L. Haletky VMware Communities User Moderator, VMware vExpert 2009, Virtualization Practice Analyst
Now Available: 'VMware vSphere(TM) and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing the Virtual Environment'
Also available 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise'
SearchVMware Pro|Blue Gears|Top Virtualization Security Links|Virtualization Security Round Table Podcast

Re: Any known issues when P2V'ing specific Enterprise servers?

4. Nov 10, 2009 8:39 PM in response to: buddybergman
Click to view BenConrad's profile Expert
BenConrad
577 posts since
Mar 20, 2006
A few thoughts:

  • Watch out for weird boot.ini entries, I've had a few nostandard entries hang the VM post-P2V (can't remember what entries, it was 2 years ago).

  • Don't underestimate how much work a relatively new server (2 x 4) core server can do. An 8-core server at 5% CPU utilization will certainly result in a busy uni-proc VM.

  • Don't allow the VMs to use BusLogic adapters (very low max queue depth)

  • Make sure to change the HAL to uni-proc for 1vCPU VMs.

  • Using Converter 4.0.1 I've seen a lot of BSOD's on 'reconfiguration' lately, I think this can be fixed by upping the system PTEs or performing the reconfig separately.

Ben

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