Migrating VirtualBox VM to Proxmox

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BitBite
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Joined: 15. Nov 2019, 08:54

Migrating VirtualBox VM to Proxmox

Post by BitBite »

Hey guys, hoping someone could help me out.

What I've been trying to do is migrate my already configured LAMP server from a VM in VirtualBox 6 to a Proxmox hypervisor I just set up. Looking to free up some resources on my main PC.

What I've already tried is copying the .VDI file to my Proxmox server, which doesn't bring my configurations with it.
I've also tried the "clone" option, but it always clones an image of the initial install, regardless if i select to include snapshots or not. I've also tried, regrettably, to delete my snapshots so that they all merge into the .VDI, but that too just gives me a fresh install of Ubuntu server. Really not sure how to proceed.

To be clear, I have a fully configured website on a LAMP server on Ubuntu 18 installed in a VM in VirtualBox 6.0 on Windows 10. What I need to do is transfer the VM from VirtualBox to the Proxmox hypervisor, while retaining everything as it is.

I assumed when I started this venture a few days ago that it would be easy. I've cloned many disks before but never attempted migrating between hypervisors.
towo2099
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Re: Migrating VirtualBox VM to Proxmox

Post by towo2099 »

Start that vbox vm with a linux live cd, make an image from your install (with dd for example) inside of the vm, restore that image in the same way in your proxmox vm, done.
socratis
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Re: Migrating VirtualBox VM to Proxmox

Post by socratis »

Also, asking the Proxmox people would be a better route IMHO, not the VirtualBox people...
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scottgus1
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Re: Migrating VirtualBox VM to Proxmox

Post by scottgus1 »

BitBite wrote:copying the .VDI file to my Proxmox server, which doesn't bring my configurations with it.
This is expected, for two reasons:
  1. The .VDI is only the guest's hard disk. It does not show the guest's "motherboard", video, network, etc. All of that info is in the .vbox file.
  2. Since you are using snapshots, the snapshots contain part of the whole data that the guest sees on its disk. You would need to bring all of the snapshots over too, provided Proxmox knows how to interpret a snapshot chain.
According to this: https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/migra ... x-ve.9672/ Proxmox does not understand .vdi's or the .vbox file. So simply copying these files won't work. This link is supposed to be a bring-Virtualbox-to-Proxmox tutorial.

If Proxmox accepts OVA files, you could export the guest using the Virtualbox Export feature. Import the OVA on Proxmox. I would remove Guest Additions before exporting. OVA will bring basic guest settings along, too. If you have any esoteric guest settings, like unusual disk controllers, get the guest to work with basic hardware that Proxmox already has before exporting.

towo2099's idea of imaging from within the guest OS is also a very good way. Check to see if you can use a Proxmox-compatible disk image that Virtualbox makes, like vmdk or vhd, If so, add that kind of image as a second disk to your guest and use it to store the image from dd, etc. Then move that disk file to Proxmox as the second disk in the new guest and restore to the primary Proxmox disk. You will need to set the Proxmox guest's settings as similar as possible to the Virtualbox guest settings manually. As with the OVA, try to get the hardware as similar as possible to Proxmox's environment before imaging.
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