Scott McClanahan wrote:
On Fri, 2009-10-02 at 13:15 -0700, John R Pierce wrote:
ML wrote:
HI All,
So I have 5 1U servers (running Windows) that have Ultra 320 SCSI Drives in them.
The owner of these boxes wants the drives captured in their current states to .iso or .cdr or something where if the need arises the data can be viewed, used again, etc.
So what is the best approach? Boot from a Live CD, hook up a USB external HD and do what? Can I create a .iso or .cdr (or some other portable format) and have it created on the external USB?
Thoughts on this process would be appreciated.
Maybe not the right tool for the job but I always like using physical-to-virtual tools for archiving installed images. It frees up the hardware for me and I can have access to the data if I need it again by spinning up the VM.
Vmware has a free download that is pretty good at this. I'm not sure when they switched but the current version (vCenter Converter Standalone) is much nicer than the p2v tool from a few years ago. It's still a one-way trip, though, where with clonezilla you can restore back to the hardware.