CONVERT VMDK TO QCOW2

-Migrated from my original blog

This is my fist post on this blog, so I decided to do something simple. Years ago when I switched to using Linux, I started using VirtualBox to test other Linux distros, and to run Window.

SOME BACKGROUND

VirtualBox is great and easy to use, but the preformance on lower powered machines is not so great. Granted you are running an operating system on top of another operating system (especially a GUI OS) is resource intensive as it is.

About 6 months ago I switched to using qemu/KVM, first with Gnome-Boxes, then Virt-Manager. While Gnome-Boxes has a really nice interface, Virt-Manager allows for more detailed configuration of your virtual machine. So for a while I stuck with Virt-Manager.

All that time I prefered to use command-line tools over GUI tools for just about everything I do. I also hated the overhead another GUI tool creates, especially since running a vm is so heavy anyways.

I really don’t manage virtual-machines on a day to day basis, so I never really rememeber every step on what to do. This post is to not only help you learn how to convert VMDK to qcow2, but give me a reference to look back on.

GETTING STARTED

I personally am running Arch Linux, but qemu/KVM can be installed on any modern Linux distro. One reason I love Arch is the Arch wiki. In my opionin (and many others), there is no better resource for information on Linux, and Linux operating systems.

To install qemu/KVM on Arch Linux go to the qemu in the wiki. There you will see the instructions on what you need to install. To start install:

I would like to point out that when I refrence a shell command, like the one above. I’ll use “#” at the beginning to refrence a “root” command. This means you will need to be the root user or if you have “sudo”, you can prepend the command with sudo. Also you may see me use “$”, this will mean you can run the command as your user.

Once I install qemu I add my user to the “libvirt”, and “kvm” groups

Replace with your actual user name.

You will need to log out and log back in. Or you could run the following commands

Note: This only works for the current instance of your user. This means if you switch users or close your terminal it will revert back. To perminatly change your inclusion into the groups you will need to log out and back in

GETTING THE VIRTUALBOX IMAGES

When building websites, you always want to confirm that all aspects of your site will work on all major browsers. This includes Google Chrome, FireFox, and Internet Explorer/Edge. While the frst 2 are easily installed on Linux, IE/Edge are only available on Windows. But Microsoft has made VirtualBox images availale to test multiple versions of IE and Edge on Linux. Yes I said Microsoft, now pick your jaw off of the floor.

Now open your favorite browser and go to the MS developer site, and download the IE/Edge version of your choice. For the purposes of this tutorial I downloaded the IE11 on Win81.

These are LARGE downloads, this one was 5.3GiB. It took about 30mmin to download.

Once downloaded go to the directory you downloaded it in (most likely

/Downloads). Now they are downloaded in .zip format so run:

This may take a couple minutes because of how large the file zise is.

Once unzipped you will see a new file in your directory: IE11 — Win8.1.ova. .ova files are just achive files meant to bundle the vmdk file and an ovf file.

ovf files are XML template files VirtualBox uses to easily transfer vm settings

to un-archive the ova file run:

The forward slashes in the above command are space escapes, so your shell knows there is a space in the filename

Now you will see 2 new files in your directory: IE11 — Win8.1-disk1.vmdk, and IE11 — Win8.1.ovf. Finally we found our vmdk file

CONVERTING VMDK TO QCOW2

Since I don’t know of a way to run vmdk files on qemu we need to convert it. Good thing there is a built in conversion tool.

Let’s break that down:

• qemu-img — is the built-in qemu image manipulation tool
• convert — tells qemu-image that you want to convert one image file, such as .img, or in this case .vmdk files
• -f vmdk (optional) — This is an optional command (u could leave it out) qemu can auto-detect. This tells qemu what type of file you are converting from.
• -O qcow2 (Uppercase letter O) — This tells qemu what type of file you will convert to.
• IE11\ -\ Win8.1.vmdk — Is the file you are converting from.
• IE11-Win8.1.qcow2 (Can be any name you want it) — Is the output file your are converting to.

And that’s it! You should see your new IE11-Win8.1.qcow2 file in your folder. Pretty easy to convert…

RUNNING YOUR NEW QCOW2 IMAGE

To run your new qcow2 image just run:

Let’s break that down:

• qemu-system-x86_64 — This command launches quemu in x64bit mode (requires x64bit processor).
• -m 4G — allocates 4 GB of ram to the virtual machine.
• -smp 2 (optional) — Suggests to qemu to use the number refrenced of cores of your CPU to the virtual machine. I say suggests, because you can put 8 on a 4 core machine, and qemu will run, but could lock up your system. It is optional and leaving it out will make the vm run under 1 CPU core.
• –enable-kvm (optional) — Enables KVM on your vm to help with preformance.
• IE-Win8.1.qcow2 — is the path to the image you want to run.

Конвертация образов VM при помощи qemu-img в любые форматы

#1 alex

Администраторы

54 сообщений

Qemu-img замечательный инструмент для работы с образами виртуальных машин, их конвертации и многого другого.

$ sudo apt-get install qemu-utils

Для Windows(x64) можно скачать тут qemu-img-win-x64-2_3_0.zip

Для того, что бы посмотреть текущий формат образа есть опция info:

image: win_7.vdi
file format: vdi
virtual size: 34G (36700160000 bytes)
disk size: 25G
cluster_size: 1048576

Зная исходный формат можно конвертировать в любой нужный.

К примеру нужно конвертировать образ VDI (VirtualBox) в VHDX (Hyper-V) :

Замечу, что не важно какие у файлов расширения файлов, главное корректно указать исходный и конечный форматы ключами -f и -O, но все же для удобства желательно указывать расширение формата.

Дополнение:

В qemu-img версий 2.0 есть баг, из за которого при конвертации в vhdx не поддерживается динамический диск, по этому опция o subformat=dynamic работать не будет.

По этому, для поддержания динамического диска, нужно конвертировать его в vhd(vpc), и уже после в самом hyper-v преобразовывать в vhdx.

Qcow2 to vmdk windows

Добавить репозиторий, обновить список пакетов, установить новые пакеты (самые популярные)

Как выйти из docker контейнера

Допустим Вы подключились к консоли запущенного docker контейнера командой

где fb15408fd3b0 — id docker контейнера, который можно узнать командой «docker ps».

Django disable CSRF for view

Можно использовать декоратор csrf_exempt (You can use decorator csrf_exempt)

Django — rename a model field

Как переименовать поле модели в django (пример команд).

Обновление до Ubuntu 18.04 — кривой шрифт

Многопоточный RSYNC

Как известно, RSYNC работает в 1 поток. Часто это является узким местом в скорости передачи файлов. Ниже предоставляю решения для передачи файлов с локального компьютера на удаленный сервер. В конце статьи будет сссылка на решение и для папок.

Неровный график в cacti

Вот такого вида график рисовал cacti после первоначальной установки и настройки. Он врядли похож на рваный график, данные все таки приходят в моменты падений, но они явно какие то некорректные. Первое что нужно сделать для исправления ситуации это установить spine

Цели ZEN (ZenCash) на 2018 год

Из публичного чата в телеграме стащил цитату планов на 2018 год у команды ZEN. Читаем, вникаем, закупаемся монеткой. Или майним и копим. Сейчас в обороте уже 2.8 млн. из 21 млн. (для сравнения в bitcoin эта цифра 16.7 млн. из 21 млн.) Continue Reading

Жеcткая перезагрузка linux

Аналог кнопки reset. Можно выполнить удаленно через ssh. Выполняет жесткую перезагрузку системы.

Проверка жесткого диска в Ubuntu

Раньше я пользовался утилитой MHDD для проверки дисков. Но оказалось, что ее функционал вполне может заменить утилита e2fsck с некоторыми ключами. Задача найти битые сектора и указать системе не использовать эти области. Continue Reading

linux запуск скрипта от имени пользователя

Когда требуется запустить bash скрипт от имени другого пользователя, можно использовать следующую конструкцию

bash script pause

Use the sleep command.

device descriptor read/64, error -110

При попытке установить Ubuntu с флешки показывалась эта ошибка и намертво зависала установка.

Вся проблема оказалась в том, что в BIOS был отключен IOMMU. После включения проблема исчезла.

Материнская плата Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3

Nvidia GTX 1080 — установка и настройка для майнинга на Ubuntu 16.04

Поставил на древнее железо (LGA 775, intel 1 core, 2Gb DDR2) Ubuntu 16.04 Desktop. Однако после перезагрузки система не загрузилась. по сети была недоступна. Если загружать в recovery mode и затем выбирать resume — система загружалась.

После нескольких часов опытов я вывел формулу успеха: добавил опцию в меню grub + установил драйвера с сайта nvidia. В итоге система начала загружаться, и как ни странно успешно майнить ewbf майнером на 2 Гб оперативной памяти. Ниже распишу все по шагам.

Обратный туннель ssh

На клиенте за NAT (на который хотим попадать) связываем 22 локальный порт с портом 5444 на сервере (с белым ip):

*Подставьте свой user и server, например root@80.47.143.56

yii2 — миграции

В Yii 2 есть механизм миграций. По сути миграции в БД это изменение структуры.
Пример использования:

Работа со swap в linux (Ubuntu)

Основные команды для управления swap файлом.

Выгрузить содержимое swap в оперативную память

Qcow2 to vmdk windows

Автор: Сергей Кулешов

Создано 30.01.2015 10:15

Опубликовано 30.01.2015 10:15

Qemu-img — программа для манипулирования с образами дисков машин QEMU. QEMU — система эмуляции (и виртуализации) компьютера (вычислительной системы с процессором, памятью и периферийными устройствами), поддерживающего различные архитектуры.

Форматы, которые поддерживает qemu-img:

Argument to qemu-img

1. Для преобразования (конвертации) образа машины QEMU в формат VirtualBox-а:

$qemu-img convert qemu.img tmp.bin

$VBoxManage convertdd tmp.bin virtualbox.vdi

$VBoxManage modifyvdi virtualbox.vdi compact

2. Преобразование образа QEMU в формат VmWare:

$qemu-img convert -f qemu.img -O vmdk vmware.vmdk

3. Для преобразования формата VmWare в QEMU:

$qemu-img convert vmware.vmdk -O qcow2 qemu.img

4. Для преобразования образа диска или livecd в формат QEMU:

$qemu-img convert -f raw disk.img -O qcow2 qemu.img

$qemu-img convert -f cloop cloop.img -O qcow2 qemu.img

5. Для преобразования vmdk формата в raw:

$qemu-img convert -f vmdk -O raw centos64.vmdk centos64.img

6. Если LVM диски, то можно попробовать такой пример. Сначала делаем «снапшот» диска, затем конвертируем:

$lvcreate -L592M -s -n myvolume /dev/myvg/myvolume_snapshot
$qemu-img convert /dev/myvg/myvolume_snapshot -O vmdkmyvolume.vmdk

7. Копирование образа на физический девайс:

Convert VMDK to QCOW2 in Windows with these Free Software

This post talks about two software to convert VMDK to QCOW2 in Windows for free. The software I have added here takes a healthy VMDK file from you and produces the corresponding QCOW2 file. The generated QCOW2 files can be used in the dedicated software such as Qemu as a virtual hard drive for the machine. Also, there are other Linux tools that can mount QCOW2 files, you can use it in those as well. However, currently there is no way in Windows to mount them as virtual drives. But you can create QCOW2 files in Windows using a couple of free software that you will see in the post below.

There are quite a number of virtual machine software out there. Some of them are popular and some of them are not. Those virtual machine software use a virtual hard disk file of different formats. The most popular format for the disk of virtual machines are VMDK and VHD but there are some that use other raw formats as well. And one such formats is QCOW2. This format is not supported in Windows and nor you can mount in Windows OS as of now. But you can access its content using free archiver software such as 7-Zip.

If you have a VMDK file and want to use that in another virtual machine that uses QCOW2 format for hard disks then you will have to convert the VMDK file. And the software I have mentioned here lets you do that easily and in just a few minutes. And not only VMDK but the following software can convert the other type of disk images to QCOW2 such as from VHD, VHDX, etc.

How to Convert VMDK to QCOW2 in Windows?

qemu-img

qemu-img is a Linux tool but luckily available for Windows as well. This tool comes with a CLI and there is a simple command to convert a VMDK file to QCOW2. It analyzes the given VMDK file and creates the corresponding QCOW2 file that you can use wherever you want. Basically, this tool allows you to convert different kind of virtual hard disk images from one format to other. It supports VMDK, VJD, VHDX, IMG, QCOW2, RAW, and IMG like formats and you can convert them among one another easily, including VMDK to QCOW2. In some Linux distros, you will find this tool pre-installed but in Windows you will have to manually install it.

You can get the Windows binary of this tool from above and then save it somewhere safe. Next, you can add the folder where the binary files of qemu-img are to the system PATH environment variable. If you don’t know what that is then you can see this post. After you’re done with setting the PATH variable, you can start using this tool. Open command prompt or any other CMD emulator and then run this command.

Change the colored parameters in the above command and execute it. It will start processing the input VMDK file after it is done, it will leave the converted QCOW2 file in the same folder. The time it takes for the conversion of the VMDK file depends on its size. In my case, it took around 4 minutes to convert a VMDK of size 2GB to QCOW2. But if you have VMDK of large size, then you will have to be patient during the conversion process.

StarWind V2V Image Converter

StarWind V2V Image Converter is another free software that allows you to painlessly convert a VMDK file to QCOW2 and then you can use that in the virtual machine software that use QCOW format for the virtual disk. This is quite a powerful software that you can use in Windows to convert different type of virtual machine hard disk files to variety of formats including QCOW2. In just a few clicks, you can easily convert a VMDK file to QCOW2 and it even supports the reverse conversion as well. Recently, I uses the same software for VMDK to VHD conversion and now you can use it for VMDK to QCOW2 disk as well.

To download this software on your PC, you will have to fill a short form and enter your email address to get the download link. Next, you install the software and then open it up and its wizard like interface. Actually have to specify the different parameters for the conversion in different steps. In the first form, select the “Local File” option and then give it the path to the source VMDK file.

Now, specify the QCOW2 as the target format and location in your PC where it will save the final QCOW2 file.

Now, you have specified all the parameters and it is time to start the conversion. So, start the conversion process and you can see its progress on its interface. When it fully converts the VMDK file to QCOW2, you can access or use it in the software or other applications that support QCOW2.

In this way, you can use this simple and handy software to easily convert a VMDK file. And not just VMDK but it supports various other kind of virtual hard disk files such as VMDK, VHD, VHDX, etc. Also, you can even use this software to convert an existing hard drive to virtual machine hard disk file.

Closing Thoughts

QCOW2 is not really a very popular format in the context of virtual machines. And this is why these are the only free software I could find to convert a VMDK file to QCOW2 in Windows. If you are on Linux, there are more advantages for you as you can mount QCOW2 images there easily but this is not the case with Windows. So, if you are looking for some free software to convert VMDK to QCOW2 then you have come to the right place. If you can handle command line tools pretty well then you can use qemu-img. Or, if you want to use simple GUI based software then you can use StarWind V2V Image Converter. And this post will help you in getting started with these free software.