Convert Physical Computer Into Virtual Machine
Virtual Machine software like VirtualBox, Virtual PC, Parallels, VMware etc, provide the utility of not only running multiple virtual environments on the host system, but also allow creating and configuring the machines as per the requirements. The Virtual Machine software are designed keeping high-end usage requirements in mind, and therefore, such applications are authorized to gain complete control over all the installed hardware and software components. While machine virtualization utilities are widely used to run disk images of operating systems, including Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux distributions, they don’t allow converting the physical into a virtual machine in order to use the entire system on other platforms in a virtual environment. Today, we look at the the simplest way to convert the local machine to virtual machine, and then configure and run it on other systems using virtualization software.
Amongst the virtualization software available out there, VMware Workstation is considered to be the most powerful machine virtualization application, enabling users to run both x86 and x64 OS editions as guest machines. Although it’s a paid utility, it offers a free VMware Player to run the pre-configured guest systems on host computer. VirtualBox, on the other hand, is a completely free virtualization software, letting users create, configure and run Virtual Machines on their systems. VirtualBox supports virtual hard disks and OS images created using VMware, and therefore, it can seamlessly run the guest machine configured via VMware. In this post, we will guide you through the process of creating a VMware Disk of local machine, and then use it on VMware, Virtual PC and VirtualBox.
First off, you need a conversion tool that can turn your local machine into virtual machine. VMware provides a free utility called VMware vCenter Converter for physical to virtual machine conversions. It has the ability to create a VMware Disk image of the entire system, including installed drives, local drives, configured hardware and software components, installed applications and more.
Once the local machine is converted into VMDK file, you can use it on other operating system including Mac OS X and Linux variants. The application presents a simple conversion wizard that guides you through the process of selecting the local system components, target locations and target VMware workstation/player (virtualization variant) on which you wish to run the converted VMDK file. It supports a wide range of source third-party images including Microsoft Hyper-V, Virtual Server, Virtual PC, Parallels, Norton Ghost, Acronis, Storage Craft and more. The application also provides a central conversion management console to help you organize and monitor local and remote machine conversion instances. Additionally, it performs sector-by-sector data copy operations to clone the selected disks. The disk cloning process is unobtrusive, and it doesn’t prompt users to confirm the copying actions while converting the local machine into virtual VMware disk image.
Ok, let's go
To get started, launch VMware vCenter Converter and click Convert Machine on toolbar.
his will start the Conversion wizard. The first step is to select the source type of machine (physical or virtual machine) that you want to make. It supports selecting the current machine (physical machine), VMware Infrastructure virtual machine, VMware Workstation, Hyper-V Server, and other third-party virtual machines. Since you need to convert the current machine to virtual machine, select Powered-on machine source type from drop-down menu, and then enable This local machine option.
You can view the details of selected machine by hitting View source details. It shows name of the selected machine, machine type (virtual or physical), installed OS on selected machine, RAM size, Volumes layout, Total system size and other system-related information. After verifying the target physical machine, click Close followed by Next button.
In next step, it will ask you to specify the destination type and VMware product. Choose VMware Workstation or other VMware virtual machine option as destination type, and select the target VMware product (VMware Workstation, VMware Player, VMware Server or VMware Fusion). Once done, enter the virtual machine name and select the location where VMDK file is to be saved. If you’re planning to use the converted physical machine on other systems, it’s recommended to save the VMDK file on external hard disk. However, to run the virtual machine on local system, you may choose any location on hard drive.
Once preliminary settings are configured, it presents a local machine explorer to let you choose the folders and drives that are to be included in VMDK file. Here, you can exclude the local drives, and configure system components’ settings including Processors, Networks, CPU Throttling level and more.
Clicking Finish will start the conversion process. You can stop the conversion and delete the task from toolbar. The main window shows the details of tasks which are being performed. It will create a VMX (VMware Virtual Machine Configuration) file along with VMware disk image file to help you quickly launch the converted physical machine in VMware Virtualization software.
Once the physical machine is converted into virtual machine, move to system where you want to run the converted physical machine. Launch the VMware virtualization software (VMware workstation, VMware Player, etc), and open the VMX file to boot the OS of converted physical machine.
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