SCVMM and Linux Censornet

[danrhodes]

Hey all,

 

I currently have a Censornet 3.3r5 box that sits in my rack and happily runs 24/7/365. Recently it has become overloaded at heavy usage times.

 

We run Server 2008 R2 and SCVMM (Service Centre Virtual Machine Manager). I am wanting to convert my Linux box to be a virtual linux box but i have heard that is it not a simple process?!?

 

I was hoping that I would be able to dump the HDD of the linux box onto storage using Ghost and then Load the HDD onto the VM Drive. CPU compatability shouldn't be a problem as SCVMM supports emulating processors and luckily in our current box we have a P4 2.66 HT, in the available emulated processors box on SCVMM this processor is listed.

 

Has anybody had any exp of this kind of P2V previously, if so Id love a good natter about it on here!

 

EDIT:

 

Found this googlin' - http://www.windley.com/archives/2007/08/p2v_how_to_make_a_physical_linux_box_into_a_virtual_machine.shtml

Cheers

 

Dan:mullet:

Edited January 14, 2010 by danrhodes
Found some instructions

[danrhodes]

Anybody? I can't be the only one to ever do this.....can I?

[RabbieBurns]

Im gonna be virtualising my nagios box to SCVMM at some point, but at the moment all our hyper-v is in the workroom, we are still playing / learning etc.

 

Does SCVMM have a disk-to-vhd utility like VMware does?

[Kamran7860]

try this Vizioncore | vConverter Features - Functionality, ease of use for P2V server migrations personally never used it but friends have always highly recommended it.

[danrhodes]

It works well with Windows but not very well with Linux unfortunatly!

 

Thanks anyway for the suggestion.

 

D

[Theblacksheep]

What version of linux?

 

MS only support: Red Hat, Suse 10 & 11

 

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/hyperv-supported-guest-os.aspx

 

You'll need VMware if you want decent linux VM support.

[danrhodes]

I've no idea what version on Linux it is im sorry. I know I can install a fresh copy of censornet from ISO and that works! But a P2V will not :-( wo is me!

 

D

[tom_newton]

I would suggest that linux-on-hyper-v probably isnt the best option right now - IME it is doable but at cost of a fair amount of fiddling, and performance is sub-par.

[danrhodes]

I can get a fresh install to work perfectly but this means transfering all the settings over which would just be a b4ll ache tbh! I've had enough of linux for one day guna look at replacing the UPS battery now and get rid of this very annoying beep noise ive had for a week or so now !

 

D

[Vanti]

Hi Dan,

 

I believe Censornet is based on Debian Linux which is not officially supported as an Hyper-V guest and may also run into possible timing drift issues so would recommend use of NTP.

 

You could try using Acronis to taken an image of the Censornet server and then use Acronis to convert the created .TIB (Acronis Image) to .VHD (for use with Hyper-V). You may find WindowsServerHyperV - Debian Wiki a useful link for running a Debian based distro as an Hyper-V guest.

 

Blog | IT From All Angles - Hyper-V Guests: Linux Integration Components Ubuntu and Debian is also a good resource for the installation of Hyper-V Linux Integration Components within a Debian VM.

 

Best regards,

 

Brett

[pete]

There's no option in Censornet to dump the config and import to a new install?

[danrhodes]

Yes there is an option to dump settings and then restore that's what im going to look into doing. This way we can upgrade to a new version as well at the same time, easily without any fuss, turn one box of and the vm box on!

 

Dan

[danrhodes]

Just for closure, I've ended up downloading and installing Censornet Professional VMWare Image, converting it to a VHD and using it in Hyper-V. All is well now.

 

D