how to cold clone?

[mbt]

It appears that the newer versions of converter (5.x and 4.2x+) no longer support cold cloning?

And - the still older version that DO have a boot cd and support this method, are no longer free?

I need to get a w2k3 server cloned - all attempts thus far doing it the "regular way" have failed - I have turned off all services, rebooted, manually installed agents, gone through vcenter and also gone direct to esx host, all have errored out.

I need to cold clone - what do I have to do to get this option?

[Rosen Tomov]

Please upload log bundle with failed conversion to check your problem(s). There are many reasons to fail.

[mbt]

what is the process to secure the log bundle from converter?

I will look into doing that today ...

[mbt]

and also I have to say, that in my experience there is really never any way to get around errors with the converter - it seems that either the tool works with a particular server, or it does not

I've called vmware support in the past - and other than just rudimentary stuff (ip access? check - Dns? check - permissions? check) they have never had anything else to offer.

[mbt]

and I still would appreciate some clarity about whehter I can get ahold of a version of the converter tool that has a cold boot option.

What is the last (most recent) and freely available version that will let us attempt a cold-clone?

[lukester85]

If you dont like vmconverter have you tried clonezilla? Ive no experiece with it myself but believe it cold clones from a disc which is what you want? there is a load of p2v software listed here, mostly trials but i think one or two of them allow you to convert one machine as a trial.

http://www.virtualizationadmin.com/software/p2v-v2v-conversion/

Just a thought.

Luke

[continuum]

yes - thats right
the VMware Coldclone CD only comes with a small set of drivers and it is a lot of commandline work required to add a reasonabl;e set of drivers to this CD.

Also the VMware CD does not have the full Windows explorer interface so doing configuration work before starting the Converter task is quite painful.

I would suggest to use a better ColdcloneCD instead.
Have a look here http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-14671

I am the author of that building kit and if you have any issues let me know

[orthohin]

Please have a look..

http://searchservervirtualization.techtarget.com/tip/VMware-Converter-Version-differences-hot-and-cold-cloning

Regards,
Milton