Let us learn how to convert VHD/VHDX to VMDK with the support of our Virtualizor Support support services at Bobcares.

What are VMDK and VHD?

VMDK is an abbreviation for virtual machine disk, and it is a file format comparable to.ISO.

VHD files (virtual hard disks) may be converted to VMDK files, allowing one to construct virtual machines from a disk image without the need for actual hardware.

Converting disk images entails include information such as boot sequence, etc., to enable the guest OS to execute correctly in the VM environment.

 VHD

VHD is an abbreviation for Virtual Hard drive, which is a format that allows us to create a file on the drive rather than a partition.

It was initially called as Virtual Server Disk (VSD) and is primarily utilized in Microsoft’s Hyper-V server virtualization application.

A VHD can be assigned to all available space or put on several drives.

Furthermore, as they are stored in.BIN files, they cannot be accessed without first mounting them.

Virtual hard drives are popular because they may be stored in any location that the physical host can access.

There are two forms of these files: fixed-size and dynamically growing.

Fixed size VHDs occupy the set amount of physical disk space on the host computer’s file system, whereas dynamic VHDs allocate space only as needed.

How to convert VHD/VHDX to VMDK with QEMU-img?

QEMU-img is an open-source virtual hard disk converter that allows us to modify the format of various file types such as VHD, VMDK, QCOW2, and others.

We must first install this program on your computer before converting virtual disks using instructions.

It is also necessary to add the directory to the path environment variables.

Methods to install the QEMU-img on a Windows machine and a Linux computer

The methods for installing QEMU-img on a Windows machine and a Linux computer differ.

To complete the installation on a Windows machine, just double-click it and follow the installation wizard’s instructions.

To install it on a Linux computer, we need to execute different instructions depending on the operating system:

 Ubuntu or Debian

apt install qemu-img

 CentOS/Red Hat/Oracle

yum install qemu-img

 SUSE/OpenSUSE

zypper install qemu-img

Verification

The following step is to validate the installation:

 Windows

qemu-img --help

 Linux:

qemu-img -v

Convert

To convert vhd to vmdk, use the following command:

qemu-img convert -p -f vpc -O vmdk /guest.vhd /guest.vmdk

To convert a vhdx virtual disk, use the following command:

qemu-img convert -p -f vhdx -O vmdk /guest.vhdx /guest.vmdk

Explanation to the command line given above:

• -p: displaying the conversion process
• -f: the source image’s format
• -O: the target image’s format

Following that, we may import the vmdk file into the ESXi host. If the vmdk file does not function on the ESXi host, we may use vmkfstools to convert it:

vmkfstools -i source.vmdk -d thin converted_source.vmdk

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Conclusion

To sum up we have now seen how to convert VHD/VHDX to VMDK with the support of our tech support team.