Selfelected

Here is some short info. Hyper-Vmanager 2008 I believe.
I also believe one must not have snapshots. The programming here really sucks – having a snapshot stops you from handing the VM.

Stop the source VM machine.

Export source machine. One has to select a folder “one step up” since Server manager will create a folder with the name of the source VM.
Depending on VM size this might take a while and there is no visual clue about how far the copying has come.

If needed: Change the name of the folder of the target files just created. Don’t change anything within the folder structure, just the top folder. This is done in Explorer.
(I really should create a visual example here on which folder goes where. Not hard but easy to miss a step.)

Back to Server manager and Import virtual machine. Set the radio button to Copy the virtual machine. This takes care of syspreping. Don’t bother about duplicate all files; It should be used when many machines are created, not just one extra as in this example.

Importing has a visual clue. It is in its own window, without task bar presence, so if it disappears you might have to minify everything to make it visible.

Now you have to machines with identical names. Not good.
Select and then choose Settings and typically IDEController0 for the one or other to find out which resides in your newly created folder. This is our target VM.
Change the name of this machine.

Now find the folder for the target VM again. Locate the vhd file. Make a copy of it with the right name.

Back to Server manager. Go for Settings and (typically) IdeController0->Virtual hard disk->Browse. Locate the copy you just made. Press ok. Wait.

Now the machine should be startable. Try it.

If ok. Delete the old vhd file.

Tags: hyperv