Paragon Tool Upgrade Addresses Virtualization Migration

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 06/24/10

Paragon Software Group has upgraded a software utility to speed up the migration of files from physical computers onto virtual computers or from one virtual environment to another.

Paragon Virtualization Manager 2010 Professional has several functions. It allows an administrator to:

  • Migrate a Windows-based computer to a virtual environment;
  • Migrate files from a virtual environment to a physical environment and from one virtual environment to another;
  • Migrate a Windows-based computer to a different hardware platform;
  • Restore a physical system from a Paragon backup to a virtual environment;
  • Connect a virtual disk as if it's an ordinary physical disk, thereby opening up features available for physical disks;
  • Recover the operating system after a failed virtualization or system migration to a different hardware platform;
  • Exchange data between a physical environment and a virtual one, or between a virtual disk and its snapshots;
  • Clone a partition or hard disk; and
  • Perform virtual drive partitioning.

The latest edition has updated wizards for the physical-to-virtual copy and restore features; provides the ability to build virtual machines out of supported virtual disks or Windows Vista and Windows 7 backup images; allows the user to mount a virtual disk in the read-only mode to prevent data changes during the migration; and supports--in the corporate version--the export format of VMware ESX Server.

The corporate edition of the program supports several virtual machines, including Windows Virtual PC and Microsoft Virtual Server; VMware Workstation, Fusion, and ESX Server; and the open source VirtualBox, developed by Sun Microsystems.

Corporate edition pricing starts at $199. That covers one "per seat" license, allowing for the use of the software on one physical system that hosts up to 99 virtual machines.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

Featured