virtualbox.org

hello all,

i had some guests running on Vmware, but i moved them to my Imac, successfully, where i run VirtualBox 5.1.30.
they are .vmdk files, with a text .vmdk file, which helped me to import them to VirtualBox.

Now its time to move them to a Debian 9, running VirtualBox 5.2
I have setup the host, everything works, but i tried to transfer a host there and failed. I think that .vmdk files are not supported on Linux VirtualBox..
Is there any guide, anything i have to take care before moving them to the Linux host ?

regards,
George

paok1926 wrote:i tried to transfer a host there and failed.

How and why? How did you try to transfer them, and why did it fail, what was the failure?

paok1926 wrote:I think that .vmdk files are not supported on Linux VirtualBox.

Not a true statement.

paok1926 wrote:Is there any guide, anything i have to take care before moving them to the Linux host ?

I thought you'd never ask!
There is a guide which is for all hosts, there's nothing Linux specific: "Moving a VM".

hello,

this article is about moving a VM between hosts with a graphic environment..
in my case, i want to move some guests, from a host with a graphic environment to a host without..

Adapt it. It's very obvious that you need command line equivalents of the command mentioned, so RTFM.

well.. this is the procedure i followed to move my VMs from Vmware (esxi 5.5) to Virtualbox (debian linux 9, headless, vbox 5.2), using my Imac (vbox 5.1)

I downloaded both files from vmware server, xxx.vmdk and xxx-flat.vmdk
I created a new VM on my Imac, using the xxx.vmdk file (it has all the info, about disks, etc)
I got sure that the VM was working on Imac, so i exported it as .ova and transferred it to Linux.
then i used the following command to import it..
vboxmanage import --vsys 0 --unit 10 --disk /path to my images/xxx-disk001.vmdk ./xxx.ova

and everything works flawlessly

thank you very much all, for the support, especially, Socratis

Hey, I didn't write that moving HowTo, mpack did, but I'll take it
Glad you got it going. Marking as [Solved].

PS. I just noticed that you did mark your last reply as [Solved]. For future reference, you mark the 1st message in the thread, mainly because that's the one showing in the thread list, and in the search engine results. But thanks anyways...

a small detail..
when you move a vm from Vmware to Virtualbox, dont forget to uninstall Vmware Tools, because you will be not able to shutdown Windows

if you do a VBoxManage controlvm <id> acpipowerbutton it ..restarts
(win xp + win 2k3)

paok1926 wrote:if you do a VBoxManage controlvm <id> acpipowerbutton it ..restarts

That's because you have configured your guest to do that? Have you double-checked in (usually) the Power Preferences? Something like "Choose what the power button does", or similar...