The method below shows how to convert from virtual hardware v7 to v4 without using VMware Convertor.
Would there be any changes to this method, to convert a v8 vm to a v7 vm?
Is it really necessary to remove all snapshots before using this method?
If not, this method would preserve the snapshots, that would normally be lost using VMware Convertor.
The source vm is using the scsi0.virtualDev = “lsisas1068” scsi controller.
Because this is available in ESXi 4 with virtual hardware v7, would i be right in thinking i only have to change:
virtualHW.version = “8” to virtualHW.version = “7” in the vmx file?
vi /vmfs/volume/DS1/WIN2008-001/WIN2008-001.vmx
virtualHW.version = “7”
to
virtualHW.version = “4”
scsi0.virtualDev = “lsisas1068”
to
scsi0.virtualDev = “lsilogic”
vi /vmfs/volume/DS1/WIN2008-001/WIN2008-001.vmdk
ddb.virtualHWVersion = "7"
to
ddb.virtualHWVersion = "4"
Found at http://www.amikkelsen.com/?p=557&cpage=1#comment-8639
Hi
I do not believe these steps would work.
This was specific to the changes between version 4 and 7
At the moment it seems there is no method to downgrade virtual hardware to 7 other than reverting to snapshot or using converter
From http://KB Virtual Hardware versions
When you upgrade from virtual hardware version 4 to version 8, the upgrade is reversible if you take a virtual machine backup or snapshot before performing the upgrade.
Please award points for helpful/correct answers
I thought it would work unless you were using unique virtual hardware version 8 features like 1TB or ram or 32vCpu's.
The method does cover v7 to v4 but the principle should surely be the same?
This appears to work based on some initial testing I just performed.
I created a version 7 XPx86 VM in ESXi 5
Cloned it on a shared datastore
Upgraded the original version 7 VM to version 8
Powered it off and removed if from the inventory
I edited the .vmx file and changed the virtualHW.version to "7"
I imported this modified version 8 VM into ESXi 4
Pressed play and logged into the XP OS without problems (that I can see)
I actually changed everything that said version "8" to version "7" in the .vmx file. I need to try it with just the two changes listed in the first post of this thread.
Sounds incrediable if this works.
At the moment having to run a conversion from vSphere 5 to vSphere 4 cluster and converting at about 180k/s. A client VM of about 15GB takes over a day. At that rate, converting a server VM would take 1-2 weeks.
Thanks for sharing this info. After upgrading all our VMs to HW version 8 on vSphere 5, had need to downgrade some for testing.
This method has saved me hours and worked perfectly, just changing all the instance where HW version 8 was referred to (about 5 times).
Hi
Looking to down grade the virtual Hardware on a Linux server, do you think this process will work??
Also looking at going from version 8 to 4??