{"id":49,"date":"2009-10-10T21:45:00","date_gmt":"2009-10-10T21:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/?p=49"},"modified":"2009-10-10T21:45:00","modified_gmt":"2009-10-10T21:45:00","slug":"latest-virtual-machine-tools-and-tips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/2009\/10\/10\/latest-virtual-machine-tools-and-tips\/","title":{"rendered":"Latest Virtual Machine tools and tips"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As some of you know I have been using VMware for years to create and manage virtual machines. It is one of the best ways I know to evaluate operating systems and configurations with out messing up a &#8216;live&#8217; system. Using VMware (and the VMWare converter) I can also convert Acronis images to Virtual machines, enabling me to test service pack updates and application upgrades. I even have several OS X VM&#8217;s I use too. Look <a href=\"http:\/\/docs.google.com\/fileview?id=0B7TSvdc47iw0ODA1MDA2YzAtYTlmOS00MGFjLThmMTQtNDliZmQ3Y2IxYmZm&amp;hl=en\">here<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/docs.google.com\/fileview?id=0B7TSvdc47iw0MmVkYzVkZjItNjg1My00OTY5LWJhMTMtZmM5ZmMxNjQxM2Yw&amp;hl=en\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>I also use Virtual Server 2005R2 on my server\/home workdation (for XP it&#8217;s called MS virtual PC 2005) and now Hyper V for 2008 server. Using MS Virtual server I have been able to download and evaluate various full blown MS products extremely easily by just downloading a pre-made VHDs from MS and adding them to the virtual server. Things like, Win2008R2, Exchange 2007 and 2010, SQL2008 and many more operating systems applications and configurations.<\/p>\n<p>There is now an updated tool available from Sysinternals (who where swallowed up by MS) to actually create complete VHD&#8217;s (virtual hard drives) from your existing running systems!<br \/>These can be used as backups, for fail over safety, or testing purposes too. The vhd&#8217;s can be added to Virtual server, Virtual PC and Hyper V VERY easily. And they will not require another activation as is nearly always necessary when using VMware.<\/p>\n<p>Here is very good article from LifeHacker with a quick rundown of it:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/lifehacker.com\/5377399\/disk2vhd-turns-your-pc-into-a-virtual-machine\">http:\/\/lifehacker.com\/5377399\/disk2vhd-turns-your-pc-into-a-virtual-machine<\/a><\/p>\n<p>This article prompted me to revisit this, so I decided to see how well it would work with my office machine, which I just happened to have sitting on my desk here at home.<br \/>I downloaded and copied the new Disk2vhd app to the laptop, ran the application to create the vhd and saved the vhd to a share on my home server. After the vhd was created I launched the MS Virtual Server Administration console on my server (a localmachine website), &#8216;created&#8217; a new vm and added the vhd, set up the network options and started it.<br \/>And bam, it works like a champ! I was even able to connect from the VM to my office via VPN and run my &#8216;Cisco SoftPhone&#8217;!<\/p>\n<p>Now, if you have no desire to try this just take off now, sorry for wasting your time.<br \/>But for any of you fellow techies that want to learn or experience something new, here is more info.<br \/>Latest version of Disk2vhd:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/sysinternals\/ee656415.aspx\">http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/sysinternals\/ee656415.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>MS VirtualPC 2007:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/windows\/virtual-pc\/support\/virtual-pc-2007.aspx\">http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/windows\/virtual-pc\/support\/virtual-pc-2007.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>or:Virtual Server 2005 R2:Info:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/windowsserversystem\/virtualserver\/\">http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/windowsserversystem\/virtualserver\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>More info:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/virtualserver\/default.aspx\">http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/virtualserver\/default.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Download:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/downloads\/details.aspx?displaylang=en&amp;FamilyID=bc49c7c8-4840-4e67-8dc4-1e6e218acce4\">http:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/downloads\/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID;=bc49c7c8-4840-4e67-8dc4-1e6e218acce4<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Or if you are already using Windows 2008 Server you can use Hyper V:<br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/virtualization\/default.aspx\">http:\/\/technet.microsoft.com\/en-us\/virtualization\/default.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>As always if you do not understand something, take the time to read about it and learn it. If you still don&#8217;t get it, read some more. Maybe a lot more. If you try something and is doesn&#8217;t work. Try this <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/\">http:\/\/www.google.com\/<\/a> and type in your question. But don&#8217;t type it to me \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p>Other notes:If you don&#8217;t have a modern machine with modern processor (Intel core2duo, Athlon multi-core or better) and plenty of RAM, don&#8217;t even think about trying to create a virtual machines. It will be slower than a 1995 Packard Bell.<\/p>\n<p>Peace<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As some of you know I have been using VMware for years to create and manage virtual machines. It is one of the best ways I know to evaluate operating systems and configurations with out messing up a &#8216;live&#8217; system. Using VMware (and the VMWare converter) I can also convert Acronis images to Virtual machines, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/2009\/10\/10\/latest-virtual-machine-tools-and-tips\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Latest Virtual Machine tools and tips&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":587,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,13,8,1,27,28,30,11,15],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/587"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikemartinezonline.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}