Importing VmWare Server Guests

[DeLight]

Hey Folks,

As I'm planing to migrate my current VMWare Server (1.0.4) machines to a new ESX 3.5 Box I tried importing a VM.

Due to the different VMDK style of both products I issued the following command:

vmkfstools -i /mnt/windows/HelpSpot.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/48b91fcd-0895e3c5-1e58-001e0bd3f184/Frankenstein/Frankenstein.vmdk

Destination disk format: VMFS thick

Cloning disk '/mnt/windows/HelpSpot.vmdk'...

Clone: 100% done.

Prioir to this a created a new VM which is equal to the old one (regarding OS type, CPU, memory and so on).

Everything looked fine and so I tried to start the new guest OS. For the first few seconds everything looked great but then my guest debian just says: "CPU does not support long mode. Use a 32Bit distribution."

This is very frustrating because as already set the OS Guest type to "Ubuntu 64Bit". As I urgently need to migrate those machines (their are more of them) any hint would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

Best regards

Michael

[nick_couchman]

This indicates that your machines, for one reason or another, is not capable of running 64-bit VMs. Do you have a VT-capable processor? Is VT enabled in the BIOS?

[DeLight]

# cat /proc/cpuinfo

processor : 0

vendor_id : GenuineIntel

cpu family : 6

model : 23

model name : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU X5450 @ 3.00GHz

stepping : 6

cpu MHz : 3000.074

cache size : 6144 KB

fdiv_bug : no

hlt_bug : no

f00f_bug : no

coma_bug : no

fpu : yes

fpu_exception : yes

cpuid level : 10

wp : yes

flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm lm

bogomips : 5989.99

So I'm expecting the CPU to support VT. Unfortunately I do not have physical access to the server at the moment but I'm going to check that BIOS option within the next 24h.

Thanks for your support, Nick. I'll keep you posted.

[nick_couchman]

I'm guessing that your CPU supports VT, but the ESX service console output doesn't really indicate whether it does or not. The model indicates that it probably does, but it's hard to say. If you boot a linux live CD on the host and cat /proc/cpuinfo, you should see the "vmx" flag in the flags section. The BIOS should be a good indicate, though, too.

[Texiwill · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Generally Intel-VT is not enabled by default within system BIOS. You have to go through the BIOS and find it, then enable it. If this is HP hardware it is under Advanced->Processor Options within the BIOS, while you are there enabled X-Bit checking as well for EVC support. This does require a reboot of the ESX host however.

Best regards,

Edward L. Haletky

VMware Communities User Moderator

====

Author of the book 'VMWare ESX Server in the Enterprise: Planning and Securing Virtualization Servers', Copyright 2008 Pearson Education.

CIO Virtualization Blog: http://www.cio.com/blog/index/topic/168354

As well as the Virtualization Wiki at http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Virtualization

[DeLight]

Hello Edward, Hello Nick,

I was able to get physial access to the server today and could succesfully enable VT.

As it is a hp system (DL 380G5) Edwards instructions very helpful, too.

After enabling VT the guest OS successfully boots. At this point I still have some problems regarding the network interfaces which I'll hopefully solve soon.

Again, I'd like to thank your very much for this great support!

Best Regards,

Michael