P to V timeframe

Lynne Desrochers · April 24, 2013, 03:50:38 PM

My main server is running 2003. I want to move it to my Virtual Server, running VMWare (currently running only citrix). I also think I need to move it from 2003 to 2008. I'm currently working on getting a quote so I was wondering what a decent approximation of time to move from the P to V? Also, what's the best plan of attack? Start spinning up a 2008 and migrate the data?
Thank you for any advice.
Lynne

Mark · April 24, 2013, 03:56:03 PM

I can tell you I've done multiple P2V during business/production hours and it was quite fast! 15-20 mins, no data loss.

Jeff Zylstra · April 24, 2013, 04:02:57 PM

Silly question I know, but why aren't you considering Server 2012? I can't imagine that it's going to take Applied THAT long to support it!

Jeff Golas · April 25, 2013, 09:20:15 AM

Mark, if I could do P2V in 15-20 minutes I'd do all my boxen in the next two hours! As far as just spinning up a new VM and moving data over, thats a hard call without knowing what services are being moved, how much data, how fast the boxes are, etc etc. You can boot and have a server running in a VM in under an hour, maybe another hour or so for patching, and then go from there.

Mark · April 25, 2013, 10:24:34 AM

I used VMware Converter. It worked quite well, except for a few snags that I had to work through, like taking the /3G switch out of boot.ini on my Exchange server.

Jeff Z - Server 2008 is stable and "current" even though 2012 is out now. when you purchase a server from Dell right now, it still comes with 2008. plus, anyone who has software assurance -- it doesn't even matter. you can run 2008 and test 2012 until you know it's compatible with everything and then upgrade or migrate or whatever.

Jeff Zylstra · April 25, 2013, 10:27:19 AM

Quote from: Mark on April 25, 2013, 10:24:34 AM
I used VMware Converter. It worked quite well, except for a few snags that I had to work through, like taking the /3G switch out of boot.ini on my Exchange server.

Jeff Z - Server 2008 is stable and "current" even though 2012 is out now. when you purchase a server from Dell right now, it still comes with 2008. plus, anyone who has software assurance -- it doesn't even matter. you can run 2008 and test 2012 until you know it's compatible with everything and then upgrade or migrate or whatever.

An excellent point! I keep forgetting that you guys with unlimited IT budgets can afford the the Microsoft's Software Assurance plan.

+1 for the info and wisdom.

Mark · April 25, 2013, 10:37:11 AM

Quote from: Lynne Desrochers on April 24, 2013, 03:50:38 PM
My main server is running 2003. I want to move it to my Virtual Server, running VMWare (currently running only citrix). I also think I need to move it from 2003 to 2008. I'm currently working on getting a quote so I was wondering what a decent approximation of time to move from the P to V? Also, what's the best plan of attack? Start spinning up a 2008 and migrate the data?
Thank you for any advice.
Lynne

you know what -- I jumped on this thread too quick. I think the best plan of action would be to spin up a new 2008 server and migrate data. you can't upgrade from 2003 to 2008 that I know of, and you wouldn't even want to anyway.

As far as doing a P2V -- with VMware, you can test that in a production environment easily. just do the P2V but make sure the Virtual machine is set to NOT be connected to the network at boot up. Then you can time it and plan from there if you chose to go that route. That is exactly what I did.

Lynne Desrochers · April 25, 2013, 11:12:18 AM

Ok, well the quote I got was for 25 hours for this. Create a Windows 2008 server and migrate the data. Does that sound high?
Thank you!

Mark · April 25, 2013, 11:15:06 AM

oh boy.. I don't know. My initial reaction is yes, sounds very high. If your VMware infrastructure is already in place, it will only take like maybe 30 minutes max to spin up the VM, then however long it takes for Windows updates,etc.

I think I could have this all done in a single 8 hour shift, or less, depending on what's being migrated over, data transfer rates, etc.

What does everyone else think?

Coral · April 25, 2013, 03:33:14 PM

I had a very difficult p to v with errors, etc. It ran overnight and took nearly 10 hours when it finally did work. This was a sequel server move.

Mark · April 25, 2013, 03:43:35 PM

Quote from: Coral on April 25, 2013, 03:33:14 PM
I had a very difficult p to v with errors, etc. It ran overnight and took nearly 10 hours when it finally did work. This was a sequel server move.

I worked through issues like that. Never let it run that long, just cancelled it and tried to figure out what was taking it so long and would do it over. The thing is, when doing a P2V with VMware converter, it makes NO changes to the source machine. So you could clone the same machine over and over while users are accessing it. Sure, it may slow a little, but I never had any complaints.

It also probably depends on your hardware. I was converting PowerVault 2850's to our SAN which is Fiber connected.

apiercy · May 08, 2013, 04:57:20 PM

25 hours seems like a bit much. That seems like a "we've never done it before" time quote. Or perhaps a "we always have trouble with it so let's make it worth our while" quote. Either way I say ask them for references of other clients they've done VM work for. See how the other clients feel about their P2V competence.

Bloody Jack Kidd · May 09, 2013, 07:06:20 AM

All the P2V jobs I've done have gone faster than expected, shouldn't take more than a few hours for even a very large VM.

Lynne Desrochers · May 09, 2013, 09:03:56 AM

apiercy - exactly how I felt about it. Thank you all for your input!