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Asked: 2009-05-13 14:27:42 +0800 CST

Best way to migrate from physical to virtual using Xen on Ubuntu?

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I have a machine running 8.04 LTS that I would like to migrate to using Xen. There seems to be a dearth of information on how to do this without having to wipe the entire machine.

I do have another machine available to host things on if that helps. So the current state is

server001 server002

I would like to get to

server001

  • virtual server001
  • virtual server002

Leaving me free to decommission the physical server002.

virtualization xen migration

2 Answers

  1. Directly from XenSource:

    To P2V an existing Linux server directly to a XenServer Host

    1. Reboot the physical server that you want to convert and boot from the XenServer installation CD. If the boot fails, start again and use the p2v-legacy option.

    2. After the initial boot messages, you will see the "Welcome to XenServer" screen. (In this and the screens that follow, use Tab or Alt+Tab to move between elements, Space to select, and F12 to move to the next screen.)

      Select OK to proceed.

    3. The installer does some hardware detection and initialization, then presents a screen with four choices.

      Select Convert an existing OS on this machine to a VM (P2V) and choose OK to proceed.

    4. A "Welcome to XenServer P2V" screen with a descriptive message is displayed next. Click OK to proceed and follow the on-screen prompts.

    When the P2V process is complete and the new VM is created, you will need to create and attach a VIF for it to have external network connectivity. Similarly, extra disks may also be added to take advantage of additional storage capacity available to the XenServer host.

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  2. This no longer applies to XenServer after release 5.5. The P2V option on the install CD has been removed.

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