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E:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup>C:\“Program Files\VMware\VMware OVF Tool\ovftool.exe“ –datastore=“HDD500GB“ –diskMode=thin –name=VA-DB-I-029 F:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup\medico27SystemWorkshopTemplate\VA-DB-I-029\VA-DB-I-029.ovf vi://root:<password>@192.168.1.143
Opening OVF source: F:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup\medico27SystemWorkshopTemplate\VA-DB-I-029\VA-DB-I-029.ovf
The manifest validates
Opening VI target: vi://root@192.168.1.143:443/
Deploying to VI: vi://root@192.168.1.143:443/
Transfer Failed
Error: Failed to read from file: VA-DB-I-029-file1.nvram
Warning:
– for ‚VA-DB-I-029-file1.nvram‘ (specified: 0, actual 8684).
Completed with errors

Workaround:

Once exported, edit the OVF file and remove all the NVRAM entries

<File ovf:id=“file3″ ovf:href=“<VM Name>.nvram“ ovf:size=“8684″/>
<vmw:ExtraConfig ovf:required=“false“ vmw:key=“nvram“ vmw:value=“ovf:/file/file3″/>

If using the OVFtool make sure to use the –skipManifestCheck this allows the OVF to be created after removing the references to NVRAM without this command the OVF Tool would not be able to confirm the manifest file and will return an error

E:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup>C:\“Program Files\VMware\VMware OVF Tool\ovftool.exe“ –datastore=“SSD500GB“ –diskMode=thin –name=VA-DB-O-028 –skipManifestCheck F:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup\medico27SystemWorkshopTemplate\VA-DB-O-028\VA-DB-O-028.ovf vi://root:<password>@192.168.1.143
Opening OVF source: F:\PC_SAVE\VMwareESXi-Backup\medico27SystemWorkshopTemplate\VA-DB-O-028\VA-DB-O-028.ovf
The manifest does not validate
Opening VI target: vi://root@192.168.1.143:443/
Deploying to VI: vi://root@192.168.1.143:443/
Transfer Completed
Warning:
– The manifest is present but user flag causing to skip it
Completed successfully

RVTools 4.1.4 – Free VMware best practices and health analyzer

   Static MAC address „00:50:56:XX:YY:ZZ“ in this example XX must be a valid hexadecimal number between 00h and 3Fh and YY and ZZ must be valid hexadecimal numbers between 00h and FFh – e.g. „00:50:56:01:01:01“

1. Check VMware hard disk type
2. Shut down VM
3. Enable SSH on VMware ESXi host
4. SSH into the ESXi host
5. Navigate to the VM folder
6. Clone the VMDK to a thin provisioned disk using vmkfstools
   

   vmkfstools -i <sourcename>.vmdk -d thin <targetname>.vmdk

7. Rename old flat file
8. Rename new flat file

VMware OVF Tool  – some file systems have a restriction on maximum file size for example FAT32 allows files only up to 2GB you can split the OVF files from a generated package into pieces of a specified maximum size

ovftool –chunkSize=2gb <source> package.ovf