VMware to HyperV Migration

Microsoft has released a small but powerful tool for converting VMware Virtual Machines to HyperV virtual machines called Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter (MVMC).  This tool is able to convert the entire virtual machine including virtual disk and configuration files to HyperV format ready to use on a Windows Server 2012 hypervisor.

Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter comes part of the Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter Solution Accelerator package which can be downloaded from the following URL:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=34591

Before installing the product, you must ensure your system is running .NET Framework version 4.5 which is required by the application.

There tool is available in two form factors:

• Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter Solution Accelerator
• Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter Plug-in for VMware vSphere Client

Both of these factors can be downloaded from the above Microsoft TechNet page.

The Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter Plug-in for VMware vSphere client allows you to convert the virtual machines straight the vSphere client by simply right clicking the virtual machine and selecting "Convert to Hyper-V virtual machine"

 

It is important to note that as of this writing only the following VMware platforms are supported for this method of migration.

• vCenter Server 5.0
• vCenter Server 4.1
• VMware ESXi Server 5.0
• VMware ESXi/ESX Server 4.1

My environment is running VMware ESXi Server 5.5 and as a result this is not supported so the following error was received:

Microsoft Virtual Machine Converter is not compatible with this version of vCenter/ESX/ESXi server.

 

 

 If I was using an older version of ESX, you would see a wizard as shown on the following blog post:

http://www.ivobeerens.nl/2012/07/30/convert-vmware-to-hyper-v-vms-with-microsoft-virtual-machine-converter/

You can however convert VMware 5.5 vmdk files to VHD using the command line utility.

Simply use the following symtax:

MVDC.exe "vmdk source path" "target"

For example in the following screenshot I have converted a Windows 8 vmdk file to a VHD file.

It is also possible to convert VMware Virtual Machine configuration files to HyperV configuration files using the MVMC.exe command line utility.

For more information on this tool please see the official Microsoft TechNet article available from:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh967435