Convert UCS from dedicated hardware to VMs

#1

All, I am running several UCS and windows machines on dedicated hardware. Since this is getting old now I need to shift everything on new machines or convert everything to VMs which might be a safer and more economical solution for the future.

I am considering to use proxmox. What is the overall experience with proxmox ? What is the best way to convert a master domain controller installation to a VM ? Do you recommend to get extra tools to do this ? Do you have any links for UCS conversion to VMs which might be helpful ?

Thanks for your help.

#2

I’ve been quite happy with Proxmox now for quite a few years. I think I started with version 5 and it’s up to 8 now.

Most of my VMs were installed from scratch, but I did move a couple over using drive cloning. There is a guide on the Proxmox site on converting a physical machine to a virtual one. I’m pretty sure that’s what I used before. I’d recommend poking around on all the migration pages a bit to make sure you pick the best option for your particular situation. If you get it wrong and have to start over it’s a frustrating waste of time.

Advanced_Migration_Techniques_to_Proxmox_VE

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#3

Same here, we’ve been using Proxmox cluster to host UCS servers for a good year now. No issues with performance and so simple to recover if a naughty admin messes with configuration :wink:

We installed UCS fresh on Proxmox, but for Windows migration you can try disk2vhd. Just make sure to install VirtIO drivers before migration! Makes life so much easier :sweat_smile:

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#4

Thanks for your feedback. What’s the best way to move the bare metal UCS servers to Proxmox ? Copy everything from bare metal or install the server first and restore settings afterwards ?

#5

Good question and well presented :wink:
I guess it is also a rather philosophical question too.

Do you need to keep all that’s accumulated on the server - p2v (clonezilla)
Are you sure config backup covers all what’s needed - clean install and restore

In either case, give yourself time to play with proxmox and see how it is working. Familiarize with networking (SDN if you are planning on using it), virtual hardware allocation, storage on proxmox and storage for VMs.
Deploy few VMs and see how they behave, add/remove virtual network cards and check how this affects the VM installation (we had problems with networks and VLANs going rogue on UCS after some proxmox changes).

This will make troubleshooting much easier and thus transition smoother.

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