If the host doesnt support software raid, you can use software raid from the guest os. Recommended raid settings for hdd and ssd disks starwind. How to install centos 6 software raid 10 with vmware. Software raid 5 always missing 1 disk after reboot. While vmware converter 5 does a good job livecloning the existing linux servers, sometimes you have to use the cold clone boot cd if the physical server uses software raid and then boot vm from the broken mirror side, or sometimes the. As a type 1 hypervisor, esxi is not a software application that is installed on an operating system os.
But for the supported guest oses it could become more complicated, because new version add new oses, but also remove the old oses no more supported by the vendor. Vmware esxi formerly esx is an enterpriseclass, type 1 hypervisor developed by vmware for deploying and serving virtual computers. Vmware converter guest os support vinfrastructure blog. It also supports conversion of thirdparty virtual machines like hyperv and kvm. Using starwind vsan, the process of deploying vms, providing faulttolerant storage, connecting it to hypervisor, and creating highly available vms becomes a piece o cake.
How to virtualize this oldish linux server to vmware. Id like to completely migrate that raid over to my esxi host, without losing the data on the raid. Ip address and credentials for your linux pcserver. I got converter to do a trial run on a simple disk single drive successfully, but ive seen a lot of threadsforums about 3. Instead of using motherboard raid to create a raid1 array can i present two vanilla. Will a ex software raid 1 disk boot without raid software. All the solutions ive see using raid 1 have you break the raid and reboot using only one disk which sounds sketchy in your case. I believe it was redhat linux, and suse for example. Adding an old software raid array to a software raid installation boot problems. This actual p2v process was completed using the free vmware converter standalone. How to remove sw raid for vmware converter to work david hrbac.
For your information, i created the acronis image using both linux hdd. How to convert a remote physical linux server to a virtual. I have been reading through its documentation though, and found something surprising. The last versions of vmware converter claim to support p2v of linux based servers. Reconfigure your esxi host to increase the usable storage capacity. Other than that, no, its not possible to do what you want. I think a manual approach would be more feasible here. Where i can download the vmware converter linux version. How to remove linux software raid1 md raid onthefly so that.
It is recommended assigning more vcpus to starwind vm which has linux software raid configured. Vmware converter is very powerful tool to provide physical to virtual conversion. Even now, many years after physical to virtual p2v conversion in many enterprises has finished, there are systems to convert or reconfigure, as the tool can also optimize and resize disks and their layout. Sep 06, 2017 vmware vcenter converter standalone is an easy tool that enables you to convert physical servers windows or linux to virtual machines. I currently run a baremetal linux server that has a 5x1tb raid5. At first, vmware converter 5 is a software which permits you to convert physical server or pc into virtual machine. I would contact the provider and express your intentions to see what they have that could meet vmware s hardware requirements. Troubleshooting checklist for vmware converter 1016330. We are planning to convert a physical machine raid 1 to virtual machine using vmware standalone converter. Using vmware converter for your conversion as a tool is pretty straightforward. Ive allowed root login over ssh, which isnt a best security practice, but was requested by the converter utility. Zfs, lvm or any device mapper based solution, md, btrfs. This magical piece of this free software can at the same time align properly the destination vms virtual disks in order to get the best possible performance. Supported linux distributions are listed on the first screen but include.
Physicalraid 1 to virtual using vmware standalone converter. Vmware esxi can live on a non raid disk or a hardware raid solution, but has no provision for software raid. Convert physical linux server to vmware p2v vmware starwind. Vmware esxi can live on a nonraid disk or a hardware raid solution, but has no provision for software raid. Are raid disks really universally unsupported for vmware. Ubuntu software raid server and vmware conversion tool. The cold clone will have trouble figuring out your software raid. Im not sure if the following will help you because i dont know anything about the vmware p2v converter, but here goes. The converter standalone sdk is a zip file that contains the following items.
Centralized management console allows users to queue up and monitor multiple simultaneous remote, as well as local, conversions. Convert physical linux server to vmware starwind blog. Breaking a linux software raid 1 for import using vmware. Raid drives are listed as unsupported source volumes for all formats. Converting a physical linux machine to use in vmware. If you need to convert thousands of vms, you should use another tool that brings more automation such as double. Can you software raid storage presented to the hypervisor. I was looking at possibly using clonezilla and it doesnt support software raid in linux either. The vmware vcenter converter standalone api provides languageneutral interfaces to the converter standalone server management framework. Read the starwind article to find out how to convert a physical linux server to.
Vmware converter installation on ubuntu linux linux users will be pleased to discover that vmware converter is now available on linux free of charge. Software raid, such as intel rste in the c612 chipset i am looking to enable, actually has the bios supply that metadata required for the raid set created in a different memory address. Jan 23, 2019 recommended settings for linux software raid with starwind vsan for vsphere. Top tips for using vmware vcenter converter 4sysops. Now the initial ramdisk has no nf, and the partition type is no longer set to linux raid autodetect type fd. If you did not modify storage disks, you can use the raid utility to change the hardware raid level. The following steps will be taken to convert existing physical linux server to a virtual image. Starwind virtual san for vsphere linux software raid configuration. Would someone be able to tell me the best process for converting the already running linux machine to a virtual machine to be used in esxi. Make a vmware copy of a live linux server cedric walter home. That raises a great question in our smaller compellentvmware solutions. Linux software raid1 md raid onthefly so that vmware converter.
Mar 19, 20 at first, vmware converter 5 is a software which permits you to convert physical server or pc into virtual machine. Vmware vcenter converter standalone free download vmware vsphere hypervisor esxi iso image includes vmware tools quick overview of the process. To host vmware vcenter converter standalone, you need a physical or. There is quite a few resources around when it comes to converting windows boxes to virtual machines. After you get the grubinstaller error, log on to vsphere console. Virtualizing old centos 5 server with software raid disks. Converter standalone does not recognize source volumes that reside on linux software raid configurations during cloning of powered on linux machines, converter standalone does not recognize source volumes that are part of a software raid configuration also referred to as multiple disk, or md, configurations. Configure software raid on a linux vm azure linux virtual. Vmware vcenter standalone converter platforms support goes almost with the vsphere version, so if you need to support vsphere 6.
Physical raid 1 to virtual using vmware standalone converter spiceworks. As a user of vmware products this makes me very happy, meaning i do not have to be booting the windows machine just to use vmware converter. Typically this can be used to improve performance and allow for improved throughput compared to using just a single disk. Jan 12, 2017 ip address and credentials for your linux pcserver. Power down, remove one of the raid1 disks, and the system should boot and run now off the other disk without raid. Lets say i have a 2 vmfs luns on a single tray of fc. It really doesnt matter if physical server used raid, software or not, because everything is copied by converter on file lever rather than block level. Compellent allows us to create raid10 and raid5 5 disk and raid5 9disk luns all on the same sets of hard disks. Linux software raid mdadm, mdraid can be used as an underlying storage device for starwind virtual san devices. Here is what converter does for live linux conversions create the target vm with the required hardware configuration.
Anyone have any experience with vmware converter 3. Vmware vcenter converter standalone can be run on a wide variety of hardware and supports most. Moving archlinux with software raid1 to vmware solutions. Dec 11, 2010 now the initial ramdisk has no nf, and the partition type is no longer set to linux raid autodetect type fd. Can the guest machine be setup on version 7, or version 10 will be good. Mount the original linux distribution dvd on to the virtual machine and boot from. But what to do if you want to convert a linux machine which does not have gui graphical user interface. Boots the destination vm from a live linux iso and then. Unfortunately converter does not support software raid configurations. Starwind virtual san for vsphere linux software raid. How to remove sw raid for vmware converter to work david. I would contact the provider and express your intentions to see what they have that could meet vmwares hardware requirements. I also tried to restor manually the image created with acronis.
Jul 02, 2016 how to install centos 6 software raid 10 with vmware. How to p2v linux into vmware esx server esx virtualization. Its quite easy to make p2v of windows base servers. Resolving linux boot issues after p2v with vmware converter. Disk mirroring is a great way to gain some insurance against a single disk failure bringing down a critical system, as everything rewritten to one disk is also written to the other disk. You cant get the hba to see you existing data since the ondisk format is different, and even if you could magically do that, then youd be presenting a file system that esxi doesnt support. Once you have downloaded and installed vmware vcenter converter standalone 6. Extract the converter package on your linux server. Gentoo linux wouldnt have been a supported source for vmware converter cold clone. Esxi itself doesnt support any software raid implementation in any way, shape or form. Aug 20, 2012 break software mirror for vmware converter. Dec 20, 2014 it really doesnt matter if physical server used raid, software or not, because everything is copied by converter on file lever rather than block level.
I downloaded vmware s vcenter converter standalone version 6. You will see the new virtual machine created with correct vm configuration, but you will not be able to boot it up. Feb 10, 2012 while vmware converter 5 does a good job livecloning the existing linux servers, sometimes you have to use the cold clone boot cd if the physical server uses software raid and then boot vm from the broken mirror side, or sometimes the resulting vm does not boot because of issues with bootloader. I downloaded vmwares vcenter converter standalone version 6. How to remove linux software raid1 md raid onthefly so. If you added physical disks, you can include all disks into a single raid, or create a separate raid using only the new disks. Therefore, the kernel drivers for the software raid needs to be able to read this.
As for converter supporting software raid, that is a very complex problem that not a lot of conversion tools dont support. Adding an old softwareraid array to a softwareraid installation boot problems. Jul 22, 2017 converter standalone does not recognize source volumes that reside on linux software raid configurations during cloning of powered on linux machines, converter standalone does not recognize source volumes that are part of a software raid configuration also referred to as multiple disk, or md, configurations. Converter standalone supports all types of basic and dynamic disks for diskbased conversions except for gptmbr hybrid disks converter standalone supports source and destination disk drives with 512b 512e and 512n disk sector size only. If you have a small number of machines to convert, you can use this tool because its free. Its a common scenario to use software raid on linux virtual machines in azure to present multiple attached data disks as a single raid device. Linux has supported the idea of software raid, particularly raid 1 or disk mirroring for a long time. Converter cannot query linux source when a volume is mounted more than once.
Disc space is 280gb in a raid 1 config and 4750gb in a 3 disc raid5 with the 4th being autofail. I plan to use the vmware converter, rather than the acronis vm recovery. Vmware vcenter converter standalone is an easy tool that enables you to convert physical servers windows or linux to virtual machines. Vmware converter best practices esx virtualization. Vmware vcenter converter is a free tool that is an indispensable utility for vmware administrators.
Vmware converter does not support software raid on linux. Converter is a pretty well made tool for being free. During cloning of poweredon linux machines, converter standalone does not recognize source volumes that are part of a software raid configuration also referred to as multiple disk, or md, configurations. I have a hosted virtual private ubuntu server that i have no physical access to. Sample code demonstrating common use cases for programmatically managing converter standalone server. I have tried to convert this machine using and acronis image with vmware converter.
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