VMware Converter Enterprise Update 2 for VirtualCenter 2.5
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| Operating System on Which Converter Enterprise Server is Installed |
Compatible Source Virtual Machine or Third-Party Image Operating System | ||||
| Windows NT | Windows 2000 | Windows XP | Windows 2003 | Windows Vista | |
| Windows 2000 | X | X | |||
| Windows XP Pro | X | X | X | X | X |
| Windows 2003 Server SP1 | X | X | X | X | X |
| Windows 2003 Server R2 | X | X | X | X | X |
| Windows Vista (32-bit and 64-bit) | X | X | X | X | X |
Interoperability and Supported Guest Operating Systems
VMware Converter Enterprise for VirtualCenter 2.5 supports the following sources and destinations:
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Import from Physical Machines (Source) |
Import from Various Third-Party Formats and VMware Products (Source) |
Export to a Virtual Machine for VMware Hosted and Datacenter Products (Destination) |
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Operating systems that can be imported to VI3 virtual machines using hot or cold cloning:
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For conditions and limitations in importing StorageCraft ShadowProtect, Acronis True Image, and Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery images, see the VMware Converter Enterprise for VirtualCenter Administration Guide.
Support for the following guest operating systems is experimental. VMware Converter Enterprise for VirtualCenter can clone source images containing these operating systems, but the destination virtual machine may or may not work without additional configuration after import. In particular, if the source image contains unsupported hardware, you might need to modify the configuration of the destination virtual machine before using it:
- Linux
- Windows NT 3.x
- Windows ME
- Windows 98
- Windows 95
- MS-DOS
Known Issues
This VMware Converter Enterprise release contains the following known issues.
No warning message appears when you delete a Converter Enterprise server
If you delete a Converter Enterprise server (that you have installed on a Microsoft Windows 2003, R2, SP1 host) using the installer, when you click Remove on the Program Maintenance page, the server is deleted without a user confirmation prior to the deletion. This is true even if the Converter service is still running. There is no workaround at this time.
Cloning a virtual machine running Microsoft Windows fails if you have modified multi syntax in the boot.ini file
If you have modified multi syntax [multi(xxx)disk(xxx) rdisk(xxx)partition(xxx)\%systemroot%] in the boot.ini file, attempting to clone (either hot or cold clone) a machine running Microsoft Windows fails. Converter does not support systems with a boot.ini that has lines different from the form described here. The workaround is to use the standard syntax. For more information, see http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1005291.
On a Windows Vista virtual machine that has more than one virtual NIC, some NICs don't capture the static IP addresses when customization is used to set them
If you try to configure static IP settings for more than one NIC on a Vista guest operating system, the settings might not be applied correctly to all NICs. The workaround is to manually configure the static IP settings.
Get an error when customizing an imported virtual machine
When you customize an imported virtual machine and the importing percent reaches 100 percent, an error (UNKNOWN_METHOD_FAULT.summary) appears. If you are experiencing this problem with your Converter Enterprise server running Microsoft Windows 2000, the workaround is to upgrade to SP3 or higher. If you are experiencing this problem with Microsoft Windows XP, upgrade to SP1 or higher..
When importing a virtual machine, task does not complete if the machine name is too big
When you import a virtual machine and give the destination virtual machine a name that exceeds 60 characters, the task will not complete. The destination virtual machine name field allows for up to 80 characters, but a timestamp is appended to the name you select. If the combination of characters in the name and timestamp exceeds this limit, the problem occurs. The workaround is to use destination machine names of 60 characters or less.
Upgrade from U2 English version to U2 localized version requires removing English version
If you have installed the English version of Upgrade 2, and want to install the localized version of Upgrade 2, you must remove the English version first and then install the localized version. There is no workaround at this time.
Microsoft Windows NT does not preserve the drive letters in a cloned virtual machine
If you clone a Windows NT4 machine and select the "create a separate disk for each volume" option, volume drive letters in the target virtual machine are modified with the exception of active and system volumes. The workaround is to manually reset volume drive letters by launching Disk Administrator in the target virtual machine, right clicking the volume, and invoking the Assign Drive Letter option.
Error message appears during download of the Converter plug-in
After a successful installation of Update Manager and Converter, when you download the converter plug-in, an error message (Error reading setup initialization file) appears. The download and installation does not proceed, though a subsequent message "The plug-in has downloaded and is being installed" appears. The workaround is to log out from VirtualCenter and log in again. The Converter plug-in download is actually successful, even though the error message displayed and the process appeared to stop.
Restarting VirtualCenter Server when Converter Enterprise is importing a virtual machine causes out of sync inventory
If you restart VirtualCenter Server during an import, the Recent Tasks pane does not show the running Converter tasks. The target virtual machine is unusable if VirtualCenter Server is stopped while the import task is running. You must remove the target virtual machine and reimport it.
Importing a Windows Vista source machine with invalid customization values corrupts the destination machine
The destination virtual machine issues an error message and reboots over and over if any of the following situations occur when you customize your Windows Vista source machine:
- The product key is incorrect
- The domain name or domain administrator credentials are invalid
- The domain controller is unreachable because, for example, the virtual machine has no network connectivity or the domain controller is not in the network.
Converter Enterprise allows import of powered on hosted sources
Converter Enterprise allows import of powered on or suspended hosted sources, but this action is not supported. The tool must terminate with an error message when you try to import a Workstation 5.5 or 6.0 source machine.
Workaround: Shut down and power off the virtual machine before importing it.
Setting the firewall on Windows systems to allow incoming file share connections
To allow incoming file share connections, you must set Windows Firewall in the following cases:
- When the machine is used to host standalone images
- When the machine is used as a standalone destination
- When the machine will be remotely hot cloned
Windows XP
- Go to Start > Settings > Control Panel > Windows Firewall.
- Click the Exceptions tab and select File and Printer Sharing.
- Click Edit.
- For each listed port, click Change Scope and select Custom list.
- Add the range of IP addresses that need access.
Windows Vista
- Open the Control Panel and select Administrative tools > Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.
- Double-click Inbound rules and in the list of rules, select the rule(s) for File and Printer Sharing (SMB-in).
- Select View Properties and under Properties, select Scope and select Remote IP address.
- Any IP address
- Custom list of IP addresses which need access to the file server (By default, this list contains "local subnet")
Manual uninstall of VMware Converter Enterprise Agent from remote source physical machine may be required
In some cases, manual cleanup of the Converter Enterprise Agent may be required. You can uninstall VMware Converter Enterprise Agent from the Add/Remove Programs control panel on the source physical machine.
Source with mixed IDE and SCSI disks might not produce a bootable virtual machine
A source machine with both SCSI and IDE disks has the IDE disks attached to the end of the disk list.
If the source machine boots from an IDE disk, the target virtual machine created by Converter Enterprise boots from the wrong disk because a VMware virtual machine looks for the first disk in the disk list. Workaround:
- Boot the imported virtual machine and press F2 to enter the BIOS
- Go to the Boot menu
- Highlight the Hard Drive row and press Enter
- Change the boot order of the disks so that the system disk is first
- Continue
Sysprep deletes drive letter mappings if your task includes customization
If you choose customization options and the destination virtual machine fails at a "Please Wait" screen after
the second sysprep reboot, you will need to rerun the import without customization. This occurs because of
a problem with Microsoft's sysprep, which has deleted the drive letter mappings, preventing access to certain files.
Customization not applied if virtual machine manually restarted after reconfiguration
The process for customization occurs in this order:
- Customize the virtual machine image with Converter Enterprise and wait for 100% Complete
- Power on the virtual machine
- Wait for it to reboot automatically
- Sysprep processes the customizations
- Sysprep reboots the virtual machine
- The Windows operating system loads, and the network configurations occur
Workaround: Turn off Autologon in the source machine. Wait for the machine to automatically reboot during the first boot up. After the first boot, the machine reboots twice before you can safely log in.
Converter Enterprise does not distinguish between physical serial ports and virtual serial ports on the source machine
Virtual serial ports are treated as physical serial ports during the migration. For instance, if a source machine has two physical serial ports and two virtual serial ports, the import creates four serial ports on the destination machine.
Importing a Windows 2000 virtual machine fails when an OEM-type partition is selected
When selecting individual volumes for a clone, with or without resizing the volumes, do not select any OEM or diagnostic partitions on the disk. The only volumes needed are the active, system, and any data partitions.
Cloning a large disk with lots of free space to an ESX Server destination fails
Selecting "Import all disks and maintain size" on the Converter Enterprise import wizard Source Data page when converting a large disk with lots of free space to an ESX Server destination can cause the import to fail. Check the logs, and if there are error
messages with NFC failures, use the "Import volumes . . ." method with or without resizing.
Importing a Windows Vista source with a USB device to ESX Server 3.0.x causes a critical system error
If a Windows Vista source with a USB port is imported to an ESX 3.0.x destination, the virtual machine issues a blue screen on first startup because the destination machine does not support USB devices.
Workaround: Remove usb.present = "TRUE" from the converted .vmx file and power on the target virtual machine.
Reimporting a failed or canceled Converter Enterprise import task might fail with source in use
If you try to rerun a failed or canceled import task immediately after cancellation or failure, Converter Enterprise might fail and report that the source machine is in use. When an import task fails or is canceled, VMware Infrastructure Client immediately indicates this, but it takes a few minutes for Converter to remove the target virtual machine. Before trying to reimport the source machine, wait for the target virtual machine to be removed. This is indicated by the successful completion of the "Destroy Virtual Machine task" (generated by Converter Enterprise server) in the task pane of the VirtualCenter client.
Converter operations to VirtualCenter fail when the source machine disk size is greater than 256GB
When VMware Converter Enterprise tries to import a source machine containing a disk size greater than 256GB, virtual machine creation fails. This is a Virtual Machine File System (VMFS) limitation. By default, when you create a datastore the block size limit is 1MB. To increase the file size, create a VMFS3 datastore with a larger block size.
- VMFS2: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, or 64MB
- VMFS3: 1, 2, 4, or 8MB
Converter Enterprise Server remote agent deployment fails on Windows Vista Enterprise 64-bit systems
Converter Enterprise agent remotely hot clones the remote source to the destination managed by VirtualCenter Server 2.5. However, in the case of Windows Vista Enterprise 64-bit, the remote agent is deployed but fails to run. Therefore, these systems cannot be remotely hot cloned.
Workaround 1: Power off the remote source. Use the Vmware Converter Enterprise Boot CD to import the system by cold cloning.
Workaround 2: Turn off Windows Vista User Account Control (UAC) before beginning the remote hot clone. For more information, search on the Microsoft Web site for the "Windows User Account Control Step-by-Step Guide."
VMware Converter Enterprise cannot read short host names
If you log in to VMware Infrastructure Client by using a short machine name for VirtualCenter that is resolvable by the client machine but not by Converter Enterprise agent, the agent fails to connect to VirtualCenter. When Converter Enterprise Server tries to contact the VirtualCenter server during the remote hot clone setup, the following error message is issued: Unable to find the server. Verify that the server name is correct and then try again.
Workaround: Log in by using a fully qualified host name or IP address in VMware Infrastructure client. Alternatively, you can ensure that the short host name of the VirtualCenter Server is resolvable from the remote source.
Importing an Acronis image of a system with dynamic disks fails
In some circumstances, importing an Acronis image of a system with dynamic disk fails with the following error message: Guest OS not found. VMware Converter Enterprise does not support importing system images with dynamic disks.
The "Create a separate disk for each volume option" is not recommended for multi-boot systems
The "Create a separate disk for each volume" option on the Source Data page of the Conversion wizard does not support multi-boot systems. If you clone a physical or virtual machine that has a multi-boot configuration, every system volume except for the recognized system volume is placed on a new disk. This prevents the target virtual machine from booting into any of the additional system volumes.
Workaround: Deselect additional system volumes so they are not cloned in the target virtual machine.
The CD-ROM device does not work after importing Windows Vista to virtual machines
The CD-ROM device does not work after importing Windows Vista to ESX 3.x or to a Workstation earlier than VMware Workstation 6. The CD-ROM driver that comes with Windows Vista does not work with the emulated CD-ROM devices in ESX 3.x and Workstation versions earlier than 6. Support for Windows Vista as a guest operating system is experimental for ESX 3.0.x and Workstation 5.x. Vista is fully supported as a guest operating system on Workstation 6. Workstation 4.x and ESX 2.x do not support Vista. For a list of VMware products that have experimental support for Windows Vista, see the Guest Operating System Installation Guide.
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/GuestOS_guide.pdf
Internationalization Issues
VMware Converter Enterprise Update 2 for VirtualCenter 2.5 is localized for this release.
Exporting a virtual machine does not complete if non-ASCII characters are used for the target virtual machine name
If you export a virtual machine and enter non-ASCII characters for the target virtual machine name in the Export Wizard, the task is not successful. This is a Unicode issue and applies to all languages. The workaround is to avoid using non-ASCII characters in the machine name field.
The build number for localized versions of the Converter Plug-In Manager is different from the build number displayed in Microsoft Windows Add or Remove Programs
For localized versions of Converter Enterprise client, the build number that appears in the Microsoft Windows Add or Remove Programs screen is 4.0.1.62398. The build number that appears in the Plug-In Manager window when you install Converter in the VI Client is 4.0.1.62397. This discrepancy is a known issue and is not cause for concern.
When upgrading from Update 1 to Update 2 on a non-English operating system, use the English installer and not the all-locale build if you want to use the English application on a non-English operating system
When you upgrade your Converter Enterprise application running on a localized (non-English) operating system to U2, always perform the upgrade using the English installer if you want to run the application in English.
If the all locale installer is used for the upgrade on a localized operating system, Converter runs in the locale of the underlying operating system.
Virtual Machines with non-ASCII characters in their folder name and configuration file name cannot be powered on with Fusion
If you export a virtual machine that contains non-ASCII characters in either its folder name or configuration (.vmx) file name, you cannot power it on with VMware Fusion.
Remote agent installation is unsuccessful when specifying a computer or DNS name with non-ASCII characters in the Import wizard
If you use non-ASCII characters to populate the computer or DNS name field in the Import wizard when installing the Converter Enterprise remote agent, the installation fails. Clicking on the Log Info button displays an erroneous log location message. The workaround is to use the IP address instead.
Some text does not display in the Japanese version of the Source and Destination screens in the Import wizard
Some Japanese text does not appear in several of the Import wizard screens. This happens on the Source screen and the Destination screen. The missing text on the Source screen in English reads as follows: "Step 1: Choose a source for import." The missing text on the Destination screen in English reads as follows: "Step 2: Choose a destination for the new virtual machine." There is no workaround at this time.
Some text is truncated in the German version of the Resource Pool page in the Import and Export Wizard
Some German text is truncated on the Resource Pool page of the Import and Export wizard screens. The text in English reads as follows: "Resource pools allow hierarchical management of computing resources within a host or cluster. Virtual machines and child pools share the resources of their parent pool." There is no workaround at this time.
Customization may fail if a non-ASCII word starting with an English character is used in some fields of the customization wizard
In the Converter Enterprise customization wizard, non-ASCII characters are not permitted for the Computer Name, Domain Name, and Workgroup fields. The wizard disables entering non-ASCII characters for these fields, but if a non-ASCII word is entered starting with an English character, the user interface currently accepts the word instead of blocking it, but the customization may not happen as expected. There is no workaround at this time.
Installation limitations
The name of the computer on which VMware Converter Enterprise Update 1 and Update 2 for VirtualCenter 2.5 is installed must not contain non-ASCII characters. This applies also to the installation path names - use the default ones because the installer does not support installation path names containing non-ASCII characters.
Configuration and display limitations:
- Datastore names, virtual network names, and image files names (CD, DVD, and floppy drive) must contain only ASCII characters.
- In conformance with general Internet practice and protocols, the following must contain ASCII characters only: host names, workgroup names, domain names, URLs, email addresses, SMTP server names, and SNMP community strings.
- When using the Converter Enterprise Import Wizard, the date and time format might be inconsistent with the current location.
Resolved Issues
The following are known issues in build 62397 that have since been resolved.
- VMware Converter Enterprise Server terminates abnormally when multiple jobs are run in a short period of time. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- Converter Enterprise Server crashes when a scheduled task tries to import to or export from a disconnected host in the VirtualCenter inventory. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- Scheduled tasks might not run if you restart VirtualCenter Server. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- When hot cloning dual boot systems, you can clone only the default operating system that boot.ini points to. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- Scheduled tasks are not run if Converter Enterprise Server is disconnected from the network at the scheduled runtime. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- Powering on a Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 image containing a Windows NT guest causes a critical system error. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- Previously, image customization might fail if non-ASCII characters were used to populate the "Owner name" and "Organization" fields. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.
- The VI client displays an incorrect version of the Converter Enterprise server after upgrade. The Update 2 release corrects this problem.