Cloning VMs

If you've ever wished for a faster way to provision a new server into your environment, you'll be glad to know VMware vSphere fulfills that wish in a big way. When you are using vCenter Server in your environment, you have the ability to clone a VM—that is, you can make a copy of the VM, including the VM's virtual disks. How does this help provision new VMs faster? Think about it: what takes the most time when creating a new VM? It's not creating the VM itself, because that takes only minutes. It's installing the guest OS—whether it is Windows Server, Linux, or some other supported guest OS—that takes up the bulk of the time needed to create a new VM. Once the OS is installed, it can also take a significant amount of time to configure settings and install applications. Using vCenter Server to clone a VM—which means also cloning the VM's virtual disks—keeps you from having to install the guest OS into the cloned...