Move Guests from VMWare Server to VMware ESX 3i Server?

[Rob_Convery]

I have a number of linux SLES machines running VMWare Server 1.x/Beta 2. I would like to move some of the guests onto some of our new ESX 3i machines. Whats the easiest way to do this. At the moment there are no shared filesystems between the Server machines and ESX Servers.

So far I have come up with copying them to my local machine and then using VMWare Converter but this means a lot of waste time transfering them to a middle party. Is it possible to do directly somehow?

Thanks

[IamTHEvilONE]

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1037859

Read the last post.

Once you have SCP enabled, you can do site to site transfers .... Veeam should work just fine for that. saving you one copy process.

EvilOne

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Message was edited by: IamTHEvilONE

[madda]

Veeam FastSCP should resolve your file transfer problems, and its free!

http://www.veeam.com/vmware-esx-fastscp.html

[DSTAVERT]

If you enable SAMBA on your VM server you can use Converter to import them to the server. One real benefit is that you can transfer all vms, make any adjustments you want to make, like shrink or expand drives and have them automatically start when they are finished transfering. Although you can only transfer one at a time you can set them all up and they will transfer one after the other.

[DSTAVERT]

Veem FastSCP does NOT work with ESXi free or otherwise.

[robertortel]

But there is more to do than just copying ...

See here

http://communities.vmware.com/message/1041924#1041924

[DSTAVERT]

As I suggested, if you enable SAMBA on your VM server you can use VMware converter to move your vm from server to ESXi. It works perfectly. No need to copy files. Converter does any adjusting and can automatically start the VM when the move is complete.

[Rob_Convery]

Thats exactly the sort of move I am looking to avoid as it means copying all the files locally and then copying them over to the ESX server (as I am pretty sure the Converter will bring the locally to them export them.

At the moment it looks like the first step is to try and see if the SAN guys can share the storage between the two.

[DSTAVERT]

Simple to give it a try. If you are using GB ethernet it is pretty quick. Again you can set them up on Converter and have them run sequentially and fire up when done so there's no baby sitting. It isn't VMotion but it works well.