Physical to Virtual Migration – Part 2

In the first part of the series, we looked at the basics that need to be understood before migrating your workloads from physical to virtual – the difference between Physical and Virtual infrastructure, Pros and Cons of Virtual environment, and considerations that need to be checked before migration.

In this second part, we will take a look at the overview of the VMware free migration tool – VMware vCenter Converter Standalone, and how to perform P2V migration using it.

VMware vCenter Converter Standalone

VMware’s vCenter Converter Standalone is a free tool that lets you easily automate the process of creating VMware virtual machines from physical machines (running Windows and Linux) and other virtual machine formats.

vCenter Server Converter has a centralized management console where you can perform multiple simultaneous conversions quickly, consistently without any interruptions or downtime and monitor the progress from the same console.

vCenter Server Converter Standalone Components

vCenter Server Converter Standalone consists of four components:

1. Converter Standalone server
2. Converter Standalone worker
3. Converter Standalone client
4. Converter Standalone agent

Converter Standalone server

The standalone server enables and performs the import and export of virtual machines. The Converter Standalone worker service is always installed with the Converter Standalone server service.

Converter Standalone agent

The Converter Standalone server installs the agent on Windows source machines to import them as virtual machines. There are two options available, you may choose to remove the Converter Standalone agent from the source machine automatically or manually after the
import is complete.

Converter Standalone client

The Converter Standalone server works with the Converter Standalone client. The client component consists of the Converter Standalone user interface, which provides access to the Conversion and the Configuration wizards and lets you manage the conversion and the
configuration tasks.

VMware vCenter Converter is designed for converting physical machines and virtual machines for use in VMware hosted and managed products. You can use vCenter Converter Standalone to perform various types of conversion tasks.

• Converting a physical machine as a virtual machine to standalone ESXi hosts or to ESXi hosts managed by vCenter Server
• Converting a virtual machine as a virtual machine to standalone ESXi hosts or to ESXi hosts managed by vCenter Server
• Convert a virtual machine from VMware Workstation or Microsoft Hyper-V Server to ESXi hosts managed by vCenter Server
• Export virtual machines managed by vCenter Server hosts to other VMware virtual machine formats
• Configure virtual machines managed by vCenter Server so that they are bootable and install VMware Tools or customize their guest operating systems
• Customize guest operating systems of virtual machines in the vCenter Server inventory
  Migrate legacy servers to new hardware without reinstalling operating systems or application software
• Perform migrations across heterogeneous hardware
• Modify the volume sizes and place volumes on separate virtual disks