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Backing up a VMware VM and restoring to Hyper-V
  • Jim Richardson
    1
    I searched the forum but the most relevant posting I can find is from 5 years ago.

    We are considering moving from VMware to Hyper-V. We are running a free version of VMware and not sure if it is worth purchasing VMware when Hyper-V seems to offer most if not all of the needed features. We have been test restoring physical PC's to Hyper-V VM's for disaster recovery and this has been working well. Would like to migrate two VMware ESXi VM's to Hyper-V VM's. The host server is running ESXi version 7.0.1. The VM's are Windows Server 2019. The VM's are a Domain Controller and a File Server.

    Each VM has the MSP360 Server 7.7.1.40 installed on the VM. New Format backups are being used. System image backups are being made of the Domain Controller and the File Server C: drives. A File and Folder backup is being made of the File Server D: drive. The backups are stored on a NAS as well as in the cloud. We used the Dell PowerEdge VMware image of Windows Server to create the VM's when they were created. Should we complete a bare metal restore to Hyper-V to perform the VMware to Hyper-V conversion? Any suggestions or concerns?

    Are there any best practices or things to watch out for when backing up Hyper-V VM's. Can the VM's be backed up via an agent on the Windows Server host or via an agent installed on each Windows Server VM? If both are options, is one more reliable or more easily managed than the other? Is Hyper-V well supported and compatible with MSP360?
    Jim Richardson Options
  • Steve Putnam
    36
    HyperV is very well supported in MSP360. You run the VM version on the host and it backs up all of the Virtual disks/ machines. We do weekly synthetic fulls and nightly incrementals to BackBlaze for all of our clients. We keep only one weeks’ worth of VM backups as they are only for Disaster Recovery. We also backup the files within the File server VM’s and keep versions for 90 days.
    DM me if you want any specific recommendations.
    Steve Putnam Options
  • Jim Richardson
    1
    Thanks Steve! Good to know this is well supported.

    Right now we do a files backup hourly during the workday both to a NAS as well as to a cloud storage location. We have the cloud storage location chained to the local backup schedule.

    We do an image backup to the NAS and to a cloud storage location, We have the cloud storage location chained to the local backup schedule.

    We do a monthly full backup for each.

    Is this all doable within the Hyper-V environment with MSP360?

    Also, do you or does anyone else know if you can migrate from VMware to Hyper-V using a restore from the image MSP360 backup of the VM's?
    Jim Richardson Options
  • Steve Putnam
    36
    To your first question, yes this is all doable in MSP360.
    As to whether you can take an image of your guest OS’s from VMWare and turn them into HyperV VHDx files - We don’t use VMWare and never have, but I dont see why not.
    Steve Putnam Options
  • BlueCar5280
    0
    If anyone has any experience with migrating a VM from VMware to Hyper-V using a restore from the image MSP360 backup of the VM, I too would be interested in that info.
    BlueCar5280 Options
  • Jim Richardson
    1
    Thanks Steve Putnam. Very helpful!
    Jim Richardson Options
  • Jim Richardson
    1
    We did a successful restore of a VMware file server to a Hyper-V Host yesterday. Thanks to others on this forum and to MSP360 support for the assistance.

    Before the successful restore we did one new format image backup plan of the C: and the E: drives. We restored all drives simultaneously.

    We restored from a NAS to the host and the approx. 500 GB server took about 1.5 hrs. to transfer from the NAS to the server.

    We encountered 2 minor issues.
    1. We had to set up the NIC after restore to get network connectivity as it lost its VMware NIC in when it changed hosting. This I'm sure is a function of the hosting change not MSP360.
    2. The backed up server had a C: and an E: drive. The C: drive held the OS and the E: drive the file server shares. After the restore the shares did not function. Upon review it turned out that the E: drive had taken the drive letter D: in lieu of E:. Upon changing the drive letter back to E: the share began working again.
    Jim Richardson Options
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