Physical to Virtual (P2V) conversion tools are quickly becoming a necessity in the corporate server environment and data center. When used properly, a P2V tool has the potential to save hours of work when converting a physical server or PC over to a virtual server or PC. P2V conversions are accomplished using native or third party tools from a number of vendors. For the most part, when used properly, P2V tools work as expected.
However the P2V conversion process is a very complex endeavor and there are plenty of opportunities for things to go wrong. The likelihood of problems seems to increase exponentially when performing conversions during an emergency as part of a disaster recovery plan. What’s more, most tools require several manual steps and can introduce hardware compatibility problems. Hardware compatibility issues can stop a migration dead in its tracks.
To overcome hardware issues, it is critical that a P2V conversion tool is able to access and modify the HAL (hardware abstraction layer) of the physical operating system. If the HAL is incompatible with the new hardware and/or virtual environment on the target system, the virtualized version of the OS will fail to work, potentially wasting hours of work and introducing unwanted delays into the conversion process. Paragon Software’s Adaptive Restore is the solution to this and works 100% of the time ensuring that your virtual machines boot the first time without issue.
