Migration from ESXi 3.5 to ESXi 4.1

[crimsonbox]

Hi all,

I have an old host running on ESXi 3.5 which is hosting a few VMs. This host is connected to my company's network.

I then also have a new host which is running on ESXi 4.1 also connected to my company's server and also connected to a vCenter.

I was told to migrate the current VMs on the ESXi 3.5 host to the ESXi 4.1 host but I am not sure how to do that. I tried adding my ESXi 3.5 to the same datacenter as my ESXi 4.1 host but I was told to update my license server(?). Right now, there is nothing shared between the two hosts and I'm not sure how I can migrate the VMs from the ESXi 3.5 host to the ESXi 4.1 host.

Please advise on how I am able to perform this task. Any help is much appreciated!

[idle-jam]

the old ESXi is free and does not have any vcenter agent hence could not connect to the vcenter. one of the way is to use fastscp to transfer the VMDK over or use vmware converter to migrate ..

[crimsonbox]

I thought about the vmware Converter but then I'm not sure where to have it installed?

I already have a vCenter Converter installed on another host but I can't connect to my ESXi 3.5 host because no vCenter in installed on my ESXi 3.5 host.

A little lost... :smileyconfused:

[idle-jam]

vconverter can be installed on a pc. instead of pointing to vcenter, you can point it to ESXi host.

[crimsonbox]

Is there a different kind of converter other than the vCenter Converter?

Currently, I only have the vCenter Converter and it needs to connect to a Converter server...

[idle-jam]

yes there are two, try the standalone version. http://www.vmware.com/go/download-converter

[crimsonbox]

I tried it but unfortunately I still can't connect to my host..

Just for your reference, if I use vSphere client to connect to my host, it's working fine. I just can't seem to connect to it via the vmware converter..

[idle-jam]

what's the error message?

[crimsonbox]

Failed to connect to VMware vCenter Converter Standalone server at 10.188.85.39 on port 443.
Check your network connection and try again. Invalid response code: 400 Bad Request

[idle-jam]

hmm, please refer to this tutorial, where the source is ESXi 3.5 and destination is ESXi 4.1 ttp://www.sysprobs.com/move-vmware-workstation-virtual-machine-vmware-esxi-server and see if you have missed any steps ..

[bulletprooffool]

crimsonbox - just use download FastSCP from Veeam.

You'll need to connect to both servers and simply copy all the VM files from storage on one host to storage on the other host

(you will need to browse on the host to /vmfs/volumes/<datastorename>/<vmname>)

Copy the whole folder over.

Next, get onto the new host and use the datastore browser to find the .vmx file that you copied.

right click the file and say 'import'

Job done.

Good luck and please post back.