How to Improve VMware Migration Efficiency? Test with Arcfra Migration Tool: 100 + VMs Migrated In 5 Days
VM migration is a critical step that often slows down enterprises in accelerating VMware replacement. Enterprises not only require migration tools capable of delivering high migration throughput, but also need to optimize migration efficiency through multiple technical strategies.
To help enterprises accelerate VMware replacement, Arcfra provides the Arcfra Migration Tool (a V2V tool) for an efficient migration of VMs running on VMware ESXi to AECP clusters powered by the Arcfra Virtualization Engine (AVE).
In this blog, we break down how to optimize VMware migration efficiency, providing real-world performance test results and enterprise migration practices based on the Arcfra Migration Tool.
>>Learn more about migration tool features and technical principles
How to Improve VMware Migration Efficiency?
Migration speed can be affected by multiple factors, including network bandwidth, the number of concurrent tasks, and the deployment location of the migration tool.
Arcfra Migration Tool can be deployed as a virtual machine (VM) either in the existing VMware cluster or in a newly built Arcfra Cloud Operating System (ACOS) cluster. The migration tool connects to both the VMware cluster and the ACOS cluster, and copies VMware VM disk data over the network to the ACOS cluster.
As a result, migration efficiency is influenced by factors such as inter-cluster network bandwidth and storage performance. The following results show migration speed of the Arcfra Migration Tool over a 1GbE network, for reference.
Test 1: Migration Speed Across Different Storage Media of the Source Host (with Arcfra Migration Tool Deployed in the VMware Cluster)
| Storage Media of the Source Host | SSD | HDD |
|---|---|---|
| Migration Speed (MBps) | 147.5 | 46.4 |
Test 2: Source Host’s Storage Media Fixed (SSD), Migration Speed Across Different Deployment Locations of the Arcfra Migration Tool
| Tool Deployment Location | VMware cluster | ACOS cluster |
|---|---|---|
| Migration Speed (MBps) | 147.5 | 54.8 |
When the source host uses SSD and the Arcfra Migration Tool is deployed at the VMware end, the VM migration speed can be significantly improved.
In addition, the Arcfra Migration Tool supports up to two vNIC. Although one NIC is required for connecting the VMware cluster management network and the ACOS cluster management network, users can opt to configure the second NIC, which will connect to the storage network to improve data transfer speed and further shorten migration time.
Arcfra Migration Tool Use Cases
A Monetary Financial Service Company: Migrating 100+ VMs Within 5 Days
A monetary financial service company migrated over 100 VMs from VMware platform (vSphere+vSAN) in the production environment to an AECP cluster powered by the Arcfra Virtualization Engine (AVE).The entire migration was completed within one week, with over 40 TB of data transferred. Throughout the process, business VMs remained largely online, with each restart taking only about five minutes.
An Insurance Company: 500+ VMs Migrated After Thorough Validation
An insurance company first conducted a comprehensive evaluation of the Arcfra Migration Tool, covering functionality, ease of use, compatibility, reliability, and migration efficiency. The test revealed that:
- The user interface is clear and intuitive, allowing users to quickly master key functions based on their O&M experience.
- Selecting the source and target environments is straightforward — users simply specify both ends and click “Start” to initiate migration.
- The migration process requires no manual intervention. Even in the event of a failure, source data remains unaffected, and migration tasks can be re-initiated when conditions allow.
- After a migration task is initiated, incremental data migration can be manually triggered to minimize VM downtime during the migration process.
The customer then used the Arcfra Migration Tool to migrate multiple workloads in batches, including life and property insurance business systems, O&M systems, enterprise management systems, and OA systems.
In total, more than 200 production VMs and over 300 dev/test VMs were migrated to an AECP cluster. As the migration process was continuously optimized, in the later stages of the project, the customer was not only able to complete migrations within the planned downtime window but in many cases finished ahead of schedule, further reducing service interruption time.
Learn more：
Accelerating Your VMware Migration: The Tech Behind Arcfra Migration Tool
What are the available VMware migration tools?
How to implement a smooth VM migration from VMware vSphere to the alternative platform?
Arcfra simplifies enterprise cloud infrastructure with a full-stack, software-defined platform built for the AI era. We deliver computing, storage, networking, security, Kubernetes, and more — all in one streamlined solution. Supporting VMs, containers, and AI workloads, Arcfra offers future-proof infrastructure trusted by enterprises across e-commerce, finance, and manufacturing. Arcfra is recognized by Gartner as a Representative Vendor in full-stack hyperconverged infrastructure. Learn more at www.arcfra.com.