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I'm working on a project at work where my boss had me set up a test lab on a
server. I have to have 6 virtual machines - 4 NT Servers, 1 XP Workstation,
and 1 2003 Server. I'm using VMWare Server Beta. Does anybody know if it's
possible to copy a virtual machine to create another virtual machine? I've
loaded Windows NT 4 3 times within the last few days and I forgot how
annoying it is. There's got to be an easier way. I've tried looking it up
but I'm just not finding anything.

Unless I'm mistaken, you can only clone VMs from VMware Workstation 5.x
(VMware Server doesn't support 5.x VMs, at least not the last version I
looked at). Cloning will save time in copying and space on your hard
drive. If you're using VMware Server, you'll be stuck copying the entire
folder.

Russell is correct in that you will need to rename the copied machines
after booting them, which means you need to shut down the VM from which
you copied it before booting the copy. Otherwise you'd have dupe machine
names on your virtual network. If you're using static IP addresses,
you'll need to change them on the copies too.

I also recommend renaming the files in the copies. I prefer being able
to identify the VM not only by the folder name but the files too. You
have to edit the VMX file to do this, and sometimes you have to drop the
VMDK files (hard drives) from the VM, then add them back after renaming
them. (I haven't found out why it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't.
IOW, sometimes you can just rename the files and edit the VMX file and
everything still works. Other times, you get errors when you try to
start up the VM.)

Suggestion: Create a library of clean, fully patched VMs. Copy it as
many times as you need it, but reserve the clean one for creating copies
and never customize it.

Russell wrote:
> Julia,
>
> Yes, you can copy VMs. You can copy the entire folder which the VM is made
> by VMWare to a different folder or you can clone a VM. I would suggest a
> full clone not a linked clone.
>
> I have done this lots of times without any problems. The only thing is that
> each VM should/must have a different name in VMWare AND each one will be the
> same set up until you make the changes needed.
>
> I am not an expert on VMWare, but I hope this helps...
>
> Russell
>
> "Julia B" wrote:
>
>> I'm working on a project at work where my boss had me set up a test lab on a
>> server. I have to have 6 virtual machines - 4 NT Servers, 1 XP Workstation,
>> and 1 2003 Server. I'm using VMWare Server Beta. Does anybody know if it's
>> possible to copy a virtual machine to create another virtual machine? I've
>> loaded Windows NT 4 3 times within the last few days and I forgot how
>> annoying it is. There's got to be an easier way. I've tried looking it up
>> but I'm just not finding anything.