Re: Migrating Windows on a physical server to KVM with Debian Jessie

On 3 May 2016 at 19:06, Daniel Bareiro <daniel-listas@gmx.net> wrote:

Hi, Martinx

On 03/05/16 18:17, Martinx - ジェームズ wrote:

> I would recommend for you to reinstall the same Windows version on top
> of KVM, using VirtIO drivers for both HDD and NIC devices, then,
> reinstall the applications and copy the data to the new Windows...
>
> To install Windows on top of VirtIO, you'll need to boot Windows ISO,
> plus a second virtual CD-Drive, with the VirtIO drivers on it, then,
> during Windows install, when asked, point to the second CD...

Thanks for the recommendation.

A long time ago that I don't read about VirtIO drivers for Windows. The
last time I did, they were experimental.

I just do a little research and found this page [1] of the KVM project.
Do you mean to one of the ISOS published here [1]?

These ISOs have drivers for any version of Windows and any architecture
(32 and 64 bit)?

Thanks again for your time.

Kind regards,
Daniel

[1] http://www.linux-kvm.org/page/WindowsGuestDrivers/Download_Drivers
[2] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Windows_Virtio_Drivers

Yep, this is it! :-)

I have many Windows 2008 R2 64-bit running in production, with those drivers:

https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.iso

I only tested Windows 2008 R2 and Windows 2012 R2, both works fine... Boot Windows ISO as primary CD, and virtio-win.iso as secondary CD, all good...

Oh, also, I am using SPICE VDI, instead of ugly VNC... Super smooth video experience for Windows guests. After all installed (don't need to provide video drivers during Windows install), you can download SPICE drivers from here:

http://www.spice-space.org/download.html:

http://www.spice-space.org/download/windows/spice-guest-tools/spice-guest-tools-0.100.exe

All running on OpenStack! Only diff is that I'm using Ubuntu 14.04 as a host and now, 16.04, but Debian is just fine too, of course... =)

Cheers!

Thiago