Virtualization Strategy (P2V)

 

How best to stat doing virtualization today and be ready for to run images on Windows  2008 Hyper-V  in the future.

One need is a Physical To Virtual (P2V) migration of existing machines.

Current Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 Offering :

Virtual Server 2005 Migration Toolkit

A free, downloadable tool for Virtual Server 2005, Virtual Server Migration Toolkit (VSMT) simplifies the migration of an operating system and installed applications from a physical server to a server running within a virtual machine that is provided and managed by Virtual Server 2005. With Virtual Server 2005, you can set up multiple virtual machines running different operating systems and applications on the same physical computer.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/virtualserver/downloads/vsmt.mspx

Or perhaps go with VMware Server as a bridging solution, expecting a VMware -> Hyper-V tool to be available when needed.

Curent VMware offering :

VMware Converter

Use the intuitive wizard-driven interface of VMware Converter to convert your physical machines to virtual machines. VMware Converter quickly converts Microsoft Windows based physical machines and third party image formats to VMware virtual machines. It also converts virtual machines between VMware platforms. Automate and simplify physical to virtual machine conversions as well as conversions between virtual machine formats with VMware Converter.

http://www.vmware.com/products/converter/

Many things to consider, the new hardware (Dell Dual Quadcore Xeon CPU's/ 16 Gig RAM/ 2 Terabytes of drives) should arrive today.