Best Process for P2V for OS X Server (ESX 5.5)

[powellbc]

We have purchased some new Mac Pro hosts for use with our VMWare environment and we want to convert some physical Mac servers to VMs. I am currently planning on following this process:

1. Create new VM based on same version of OS X as source.
2. Create a backup of source drive via SuperDuper or Time Machine.
   1. Alternatively, connect source machine to VM
3. Use the Migration Assistant to Migrate source physical to destination VM

Is this a sound process? Does anyone have further ideas or know of any pitfalls with this approach?

Thanks,

Bryan

[ColoradoMarmot]

That's the best bet, except I'd use Carbon Copy Cloner instead of SuperDuper, and you'll want to use the mgiration assistant during the virtual OS install, not afterwards.

[powellbc]

Thanks @dlhotka.

I am unable to select 10.10 as a guest OS type since we are on ESX 5.5—will other options work for this? It does not seem to like the InstallESD.dmg from the 10.10 installer app.

[powellbc]

I am trying to boot it from the .dmg but getting the “System config file /com.apple.Boot.plist not found” error.

[powellbc]

I have a CC backup of the physical machine, but am unclear on how to present it to the VM to use with the migration assistant. The USB drive is connected to the host, but the VM and the host do not see it.

Should I copy the CC backup to a datastore?

[ColoradoMarmot]

You need to connect the USB drive to the guest, not the host.  Then it'll show up to the migration wizard during installation.

[powellbc]

Thanks. I am running into errors with that ("cannot complete the operation due to concurrent modification by another operation" error), but at least I now know the process.

[ColoradoMarmot]

What settings did you use for the clone?  It needs to be a full-drive/bootable clone, not to a folder or network share.

[powellbc]

The issue ended up being the source drive was a USB 3 drive, which 5.5 chokes on.