Question

I'm using Virtualbox 2.1.4 and want to convert a VDI file to load it in Vmware (vmplayer 3.0.0 build-197124 on Vista Home Premium).

I think we can change the vdi-Format to vmdk with a tool provided by virtualbox.

VBoxManage clonehd /vboxdata/old.vdi /vmwaredata/new.vmdk -format VMDK

Its also possible to get the vmdk file by this :

qemu-img.exe convert -O vmdk hdd.vdi hdd.vmdk

But this does not generate the vmx file . How to get that ?

Just for information the vmware converter 4.0.1 says that the supported backup images or third-party virtual machines are:

Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 or 2007

Microsoft VirtualServer 2005

Parallels Desktop 2.5, 3.0 or 4.0 for Mac

VMware Consolidated Backup

Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery 6.5, 7.0, 8.0

Symantec LiveState Recovery 3/6

Norton Ghost versions from 9 to 14

Acronis True Image Backup

ShadowProtect Desktop, Server, SBS, IT, etc versions from 2.0 to 3.2

Answer 1

This is an answer from http://communities.vmware.com/people/pajegan

You can use "VMware vCenter Converter Standalone" to convert your VDI files from virtualbox to .vmdk to use in vmware server. The following are the steps to do that:

Make sure that your virtual machine in virtualbox is up and running.

Once you open the application, click on "Convert Machine" and choose Powered-on Machine.

Choose remote machine

Give the IP address, username and password of the remote machine that you would like to convert and then hit next

Select Destination Type as VMware Workstation or other Vmware virtual machine.

Select Vmware product as Vmware Server 2.x

Choose a location for the virtual machine: It has to be a Network shared folder.

Hit Next and then check the settings and hit next again.

The task will take about an hour based on the size of your virtual machine.

Now you can copy the files to the vmware server datastore and add the VM to the inventory using the .vmx file.

PS: I wanted to do the following steps to use the Virtual machine in VMware Esxi server. However it is not working in ESXi. If anyone has had luck with migrating from Virtualbox to VMware esxi, please let me know the steps.