Issue

VMware Converter Standalone 4.3, ESXi 4.1, vCenter 4.1.

A physical server should be converted into virtual machine on ESX.

When starting the conversion, already very early (1%), the conversion stops.

Logs do not give much information:

[2011-04-06 12:04:29.455 17788 error 'App'] [task,344] [LRO] Unexpected Exception: converter.fault.CloneFault [2011-04-06 12:04:29.455 17788 info 'App'] [task,373] [task-24] -- ERROR -- Convert: converter.fault.CloneFault (converter.fault.CloneFault) {    dynamicType = ,     faultCause = (vmodl.MethodFault) null,     description = "Unknown exception",     msg = "",  }

Recommendation is to install Converter Standalone directly onto the physical machine. There, one can see an additional error message that there is a communication problem to destination ESX host.

One can also see in the converter logs on the source machine, the following:

[NFC ERROR] NfcNewAuthdConnectionEx: Failed to connect to peer. Error: Host address lookup for server  failed: The requested name is valid, but no data of the requested type was found NBD_ClientOpen: Couldn't connect to :902 Host address lookup for server  failed: The requested name is valid, but no data of the requested type was found

Check name resolution, port connectivity, and network connectivity:

• Disable firewall on source.
• Import directly to ESX host, not vCenter.

Check basic network (always take FQDN):

• Ping from source system to VC host.
• Ping from VC to ESX target system.
• Ping from source system to ESX target system.
• Ping from ESX target system to VC host.
• Ping from ESX target to source system.

Check the port usage (use telnet to verify):

• Converter application to remote physical machine - 445 and 139.
• Converter application to VirtualCenter Server - 443.
• Converter application to ESX Server 4.x - 443.
• Physical machine to VirtualCenter Server - 443.
• Physical machine to ESX Server 4.x - 443 and 902.

Telnet into port 902 on ESX host should result in the answer seen in the first picture.

When the user telnets into port 443 on ESX host, immediately press Enter several times and one will see some underscores. This means that the ESX host is answering on port 443.

Solution

Telnet to port 902 does not give the expected answer.

ESXi does not have any firewall. Firewall on source was also disabled.

Therefore, there must be a gateway on the network blocking the port.

This was changed, and afterwards, the conversion was working as expected.