I’m at a client site helping them with VMware Converter today and we came across an error while trying to import a VMware Server VM. This really should be the easiest thing you can do with Converter, but alas up came the error:

“Unable to determine Guest Operating System”

After a quick check on the forums, and some trial and error we resolved the problem. Here’s a list of things to check when/if you have this problem.

1. Make sure that that the VM is not currently running in VMware Server.

2. Make sure that VMware Server does not have a lock on the VM’s files. You have have to stop all VMware Server Services and/or reboot the (VMWare) server.

3. Make sure you have appropriate permissions to the VM’s files. This was the problem we were having. I had “read only” access to the share that the files were located on. I don’t know the specific permissions needed, but “Full Control” resolved the issue. I assume that some lower level of permission would suffice.

Hope that helps.

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