Issue while migrating a VM to Proxmox.
Posted by Potato-XS@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 24 comments
I have an old VM running on an XCP-ng server that uses HDD storage. I took a backup using Veeam Backup & Replication and am now trying to restore it on a Proxmox VE server with SSD storage.
I was able to successfully restore a few VMs by selecting the appropriate BIOS type, SCSI controller, and IDE disk where needed. However, this particular VM is not working.
Even when the restore process completes successfully, the VM does not boot into the OS and shows boot-related errors.
I have very limited experience with cross-hypervisor migrations, so I’m not sure what I might be missing here. Any guidance or suggestions would be really helpful.
AtarukA@reddit
The errors seem plain though. You are restoring to an UEFI machine, a OS running in BIOS.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Do you know how I can fix thse things?
cirquefan@reddit
https://www.veeam.com/kb3156
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Same issue.
cirquefan@reddit
It's troublesome but I have never failed with a Windows restore IF I took the time to make the new VM with the same OS as I am trying to restore, then creating the recovery ISO from that VM. That way you have the necessary drivers. You then boot from the recovery ISO, wipe the virtual drive, and follow the steps in the KB article exactly.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Can you tell me how I can do that way?
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Please let me know, if you have any other idea. I can share you the hardware config and all.
cirquefan@reddit
That's all I have. This KB has worked for me with many transitions, including p2p, p2v, and v2v. Having the correct drivers in the recovery ISO is critical. Did you first make a clean, booting VM with the same OS you're trying to restore?
dustojnikhummer@reddit
OP also posted config, his VMs are in i440fx mode, so BIOS
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
I tried Q35 even.
CeC-P@reddit
Going from memory on this one but it worked for us twice:
Clone the original as-us, run the sysprep tool in Windows on the original, then immediately turn it off and clone that one WITHOUT BOOTING IT ONE TIME. Then move the clone to the new VM host.
On first boot, before actually booting, turn the VM's BIOS config back to non-EFI (or dual mode) and then after booting it up once, sysprep should take care of any driver issues, and then you run the well documented process to convert the OS to UEFI. That part is a lot of steps but it tends to work.
porksandwich9113@reddit
On windows VM this is very often some driver incompatibility issue.
I'd maybe try to get into startup repair and boot to safe mode if you can.
That will load bare minimum drivers and basically tell you if it is indeed a driver problem.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
I am doing startup repair but not working and can't even go to safe mode.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
These are the errors
dustojnikhummer@reddit
Well, MBR disks can be used in EFI mode, did you try Q35 machine type?
Were the VMs installed in EFI or BIOS mode on the XCP server?
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Yes, I tried Q35 machine type but same result, and the old VM was in BIOS mode on XCP server.
I can still access to XCP server where the VM is running but I want to migrate it to Proxmox and facing these issues.
dustojnikhummer@reddit
Can you export the VHD, copy it to the PVE machine, convert it to QEMU disk and add it to the VM, "manually", without restoring a Veeam backup? (That doesn't solve the issue, I get it, trying to work around it)
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
After restoring.
ender-_@reddit
This error suggests a driver problem instead of a boot-related problem. I never used XCP-ng, so I'm guessing a bit here, but what kind of drivers do its virtual devices use? If you can still boot the VM on XCP-ng, you can also open Device Manager, and screenshot it with IDE and SCSI controllers and Network devices expanded.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
Yes I have the access, because it is too old so we are planning to migrate it to SSD based server and on Proxmox we have other benefits.
ender-_@reddit
I'd try following this procedure to remove the Xen drivers (both XenBootFix and XenClean); do this on Proxmox by booting to WinPE to see if it'll let the VM boot from disk afterwards.
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
This is the configuration I am using.
IdiosyncraticBond@reddit
Dies this concern the 103 or the 104 as you have mixed some screenshots?
Potato-XS@reddit (OP)
On both 103 and 104 I am facing the same kind of issue but I did the same with 102 and 101 but it show the error(MBR and UEFI env error) but it boot perfectly and working.