VM built with VMware Workstation Player does not work on ESXi

[Elisiário Couto]

Hello,

I use packer to build some appliances. Everything is working properly for every target hypervisor except with the vmware-iso. My "builder" machine has Workstation Player 12 installed. The build process is working but when I try to import the VM in a ESXi 6 host, I get the following error "Unsupported or invalid disk type 7". According to VMware KB, this error occurs if a virtual machine that is meant for VMware Hosted products such as VMware Workstation, VMware Player or VMware Fusion is powered-on on an ESX/ESXi host.

My goal is to build a VM without my costumer having to do some manual steps like converting the disk and so on. No matter how many times I read the documentation, I'm having problems building a ESXi-compatible VM with Workstation Player. The disk_type_id apparently does not work, even though the documentation states that disk_type_id 4 is ESX compatible.

Does anyone know how to build a ESXi-compatible VM without a ESXi host?

Thanks in advance

[Alvaro Miranda Aguilera]

Hello.

I can think on 2 options.

1. you run the VM converter and convert the VM before giving it to your customer.

2. Install ESXi host, and either build/convert a VM and then use OVFTool to export as OVA. That will be from ESXi to ESXi.

Alvaro.

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Alvaro

[Elisiário Couto]

Hi Alvaro,

Thanks for your answer. Installing a ESXi host is not an option for me at the moment and I will go with the conversion method.

One more question, do you know any tool to convert the VM into a thin-provisioned, esxi-compatible disk?

I've managed to use `VBoxManage clonemedium` utility to clone an existing disk but it forces me to convert it using a fixed size variant (thick).

[Alvaro Miranda Aguilera]

packer can build a VM using VMWare and use thing disk.

The disk will be then converted and the VM exported.

And then when the VM is imported, the disk change so seems not possible. To be clear this is a vmware desktop -> vmware esxi thing.

https://www.packer.io/docs/builders/vmware-iso.html#disk_type_id

You can install ESXi on a VM, and have a native ESXi VM/Template. Use OVFTool to generate the OVA should make things better.

Alvaro.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/packer-tool/9778803b-0100-40c6-9a3d-0ba7aee10cae%40googlegroups.com.

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Alvaro