Creating Windows Image

Scenarios

This document takes the Windows Server 2012 operating system as an example to guide you on how to create Windows images.

Operation Steps

Preparations

When you export a system disk image, you need to check the following:

Checking OS Partition and Starting Mode

1. On the operating system interface, click to open a Windows PowerShell window.

2. In the Windows PowerShell window, enter diskmgmt.msc, and press Enter to open Disk Management.

3. Right-click the disk to be checked > Attribute, and select the Volume tab to check the disk partition type.

4. Determine whether the disk partition type is GPT partition.

   • Yes, since GPT partitions are not supported by service migration, submit a ticket for feedback.
   • If it is not, proceed to the next step.

5. Open CMD as an administrator and execute the following command to verify whether the operating system is started in EFI mode.

   bcdedit /enum {current}
   

   Take the following returned results as an example:

   Windows Boot Loader
   Identifier                  {current}
   device                  partition=C:
   path                    \WINDOWS\system32\winload.exe
   description             Windows 10
   locale                  zh-CN
   inherit                 {bootloadersettings}
   recoverysequence        {f9dbeba1-1935-11e8-88dd-ff37cca2625c}
   displaymessageoverride  Recovery
   recoveryenabled         Yes
   flightsigning           Yes
   allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075
   osdevice                partition=C:
   systemroot              \WINDOWS
   resumeobject            {1bcd0c6f-1935-11e8-8d3e-3464a915af28}
   nx                      OptIn
   bootmenupolicy          Standard
   

   • If path parameter contains efi, the current operating system is started in EFI mode.
   • If path parameter does not contain efi, proceed to the next step.

Uninstalling Software

Uninstall drivers and software that may cause conflicts (including VMware tools, Xen tools, Virtualbox GuestAdditions, and some software that comes with its own underlying drivers).

Installing cloud-base

For installation details, see cloud-base Installation Document.

Checking or Installing Virtio Driver

1. Open Control Panel > Programs and Features and search for Virtio in the search bar.
   • If the returned result is as shown below, the Virtio driver has been installed.
     
2. If the Virtio driver is not installed, you need to install it manually.
   • For Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 (Standard, Data Center, and Enterprise editions) and Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 (Standard edition), contact your engineer to obtain a customized Virtio version.
   • For other system versions, download Community Edition of virtio.

Checking Other Hardware-related Configurations

Hardware changes after migration to the cloud include but may not be limited to:

• The graphics card is replaced with Cirrus VGA.
• The disk is replaced with Virtio Disk.
• The network interface is replaced with Virtio Nic, which is a local connection by default.

Exporting an Image

Select different tools to export images based on actual needs.

• Use platform tools to export image.
• Use disk2vhd to export image.

Using Platform Tools to Export Images

Use the export image tool of the virtualization platform such as VMWare vCenter Convert or Citrix XenConvert. For details, see the export tool documentation for each platform.

Using disk2vhd to Export Images

When you need to export the system on physical machines or do not want to use platform tools to export, you can use the disk2vhd tool to export.

1. Install and open the disk2vhd tool.
2. Select the destination path for the exported image, check the volumes to be copied, and click Create.
   Note:
   • The disk2vhd can run only after the VSS (Volume Shadow copy service) feature is preinstalled on Windows.
   • Do not check Use Vhdx because the system currently does not support images in vhdx format.
   • It is recommended to check Use volume Shadow Copy and use the volume shadow copy to better keep the data integrity.
     

Checking Images

When the image format is consistent with the format supported by the current platform, you can directly open the image to check the file system. For example, the Windows platform can directly attach an image in vhd format, the Linux platform can use qemu-nbd to open an image in qcow2 format, and the Xen platform can directly enable a vhd file.
Take Linux platform as an example:

modprobe nbd
qemu-nbd -c /dev/nbd0 xxxx.qcow2
mount /dev/nbd0p1 /mnt

If the file system is damaged when the first partition of the qcow2 image is exported, an error will be reported during mount.
In addition, you can also start the Cloud Virtual Machine to test whether the image file can be used before uploading it.