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Fix virtio-win install steps for EL hosts #657

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13fe21f
Fix virtio-win install steps for EL hosts
andrijapanicsb May 26, 2026
41be3ba
Clarify VDDK download and version guidance
andrijapanicsb May 26, 2026
108a9a7
Clarify VDDK 8 recommendation for VMware imports
codex May 27, 2026
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65 changes: 34 additions & 31 deletions source/adminguide/virtual_machines/importing_vmware_vms_into_kvm.rst
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Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -54,36 +54,37 @@ Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, 24.04 LTS


Importing Windows VMs from VMware requires installing the virtio drivers for Windows on the hypervisor hosts for the virt-v2v conversion.
The Fedora-provided ``virtio-win`` RPM installs the drivers under ``/usr/share/virtio-win``, which is one of virt-v2v's
default search paths.

On (RH)EL hosts:
On EL-based hosts, including RHEL, Oracle Linux, Rocky Linux and Alma Linux, install the Fedora-provided RPM directly.
The ``virtio-win`` package may not be available from the enabled distribution repositories on EL8 or EL9 hosts.

::

yum install virtio-win
dnf install -y https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.noarch.rpm

You can also install the RPM manually from https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.noarch.rpm
rpm -qa | grep -i virtio-win
ls -l /usr/share/virtio-win


For Debian-based distributions:

Ubuntu don’t seem to ship the virtio-win package with drivers, which causes virt-v2v not to convert the VMWare Windows guests to virtio profiles. This could result in slow IDE drives and Intel E1000 NICs. As a workaround, we can follow the below steps to install the package from the RPM on all KVM hosts running the virt-v2v:
Ubuntu does not always ship a ``virtio-win`` package with the Windows drivers, which causes virt-v2v not to convert
the VMware Windows guests to virtio profiles. This can result in slow IDE drives and Intel E1000 NICs. As a workaround,
download the Fedora RPM and convert it to a DEB on all KVM hosts running virt-v2v:

::

apt install virtio-win (if the package is not available, then manual steps will be required to install the virtio drivers for windows)

wget https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.noarch.rpm

# install “alien” which can convert rpms to debs
apt -y install alien
wget -O virtio-win.noarch.rpm https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/stable-virtio/virtio-win.noarch.rpm

# the conversion, can take a while
alien -d virtio-win.noarch.rpm

# install the resulting deb
dpkg -i virtio-win*.deb
ls -l /usr/share/virtio-win

In addition to this, we need to install the below package as well to avoid the error “virt-v2v: error: One of rhsrvany.exe or pvvxsvc.exe is missing in /usr/share/virt-tools“.
In addition to this, install the package below to avoid the error
``virt-v2v: error: One of rhsrvany.exe or pvvxsvc.exe is missing in /usr/share/virt-tools``.

::

Expand Down Expand Up @@ -146,6 +147,7 @@ This reduces disk I/O amplification, eliminates temporary staging storage, and s
CloudStack does not distribute VDDK, operators must download it separately.
Along with the new VDDK-based conversion method the traditional OVF-based method remains supported for environments.
Operators can choose the conversion method on a per-migration basis in the UI import wizard.

Host Prerequisites for VDDK-based Conversion
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Expand Down Expand Up @@ -181,14 +183,26 @@ Ubuntu:

**Step 2: Download and install VDDK**

Download the VDDK tarball and extract it on the KVM host. The CloudStack agent will detect the VDDK library
directory from the extracted package layout or it can also be configured explicitly via the ``vddk.lib.dir``
property in ``/etc/cloudstack/agent/agent.properties``.
Download the VDDK Linux tarball from Broadcom's VMware Virtual Disk Development Kit page:
https://developer.broadcom.com/sdks/vmware-virtual-disk-development-kit-vddk/

Use the latest available VDDK 8.x Linux tarball for all supported KVM conversion hosts, including EL8, EL9,
Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 24.04 hosts. VDDK 8.x covers vSphere 7 and vSphere 8 environments and is the recommended
stable choice for most deployments. Do not use VDDK 9.x unless the source environment is vSphere 9 and the
``virt-v2v`` and ``nbdkit`` package combination has been explicitly validated, because VDDK 9.x is targeted at
vSphere 9 and is not the expected default for vSphere 7 or vSphere 8 environments.

Extract the tarball under a consistent location such as the example below. The CloudStack agent auto-detects a valid
``vmware-vix-disklib-distrib`` directory when it can find one on the host. If VDDK is extracted elsewhere, or if the
host has more than one VDDK installation and a specific one should be used, configure the directory explicitly with the
``vddk.lib.dir`` property in ``/etc/cloudstack/agent/agent.properties``.

::

mkdir -p /opt/vmware-vddk
tar -xf VMware-vix-disklib-9*.tar.gz -C /opt/vmware-vddk

# VDDK 8.x example for EL8, EL9, Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 24.04 hosts
tar -xf VMware-vix-disklib-8*.tar.gz -C /opt/vmware-vddk

Expected layout after extraction::

Expand All @@ -197,26 +211,15 @@ Expected layout after extraction::
include/
bin64/

**Step 3: Add EL9 compatibility symlink (when using VDDK 9)**

On EL9 distributions, virt-v2v may expect ``libvixDiskLib.so.8``. Create this compatibility symlink:

::

cd /opt/vmware-vddk/vmware-vix-disklib-distrib/lib64
ln -s libvixDiskLib.so.9 libvixDiskLib.so.8

.. note:: This compatibility symlink is commonly required on RHEL 9, Rocky Linux 9, and Alma Linux 9.

**Step 4: Verify host setup**
**Step 3: Verify host setup**

::

ls /opt/vmware-vddk/vmware-vix-disklib-distrib/lib64/libvixDiskLib.so.8
virt-v2v --version
nbdkit --version

**Step 5: Restart the CloudStack agent**
**Step 4: Restart the CloudStack agent**

Restart the CloudStack agent service so it detects the installed VDDK library and makes it available in the UI:

Expand All @@ -226,7 +229,7 @@ Restart the CloudStack agent service so it detects the installed VDDK library an

After the agent restarts, verify that VDDK installation was detected by checking the host details in the CloudStack UI.

**Step 6: Verify required network and firewall access**
**Step 5: Verify required network and firewall access**

Allow the following ports through any firewall or network security controls between the KVM conversion host and the
VMware endpoints:
Expand Down
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