We currently have a Windows 2008R2 Hyper V server with 4 VMs. We would like to get another Windows hyper v server host to add a few new servers for a long term project.
My question is if we go with 2012 hyper v host are the 2008 hyper v VMs guest capable of running on hyper v 2012? We would like to have another Host that can be used as a backup.
And why do you not just update the 2008 R2 Hyper-V server to 2012 R2, too? It is not like the Hyper-V Server has big licensing costs.
We've successfully (and IMHO quite easily) have imported VM's created in HyperV 2008 R2 to a newer HyperV 2012 R2 host in many occasions. This was by design.
The only problem I can think of is if you are trying to do this procedure the other way around, from 2012 R2 --> 2008 R2 if you are not careful to check the generation of the virtual machines you are trying to migrate.
Basically, HyperV 12 R2 now has the option to create Gen 2 VM's which have new functionality -but are not required to run on a 2012 R2 server (see link) BUT will not run on HyperV 08 R2. So, basically, unless you specifically need one of the new functionalities afforded by the Gen 2 VMs, and you will still have the HyperV 2008 R2 running in your environment, you can always choose to stick with Gen 1 Vms -which are still totally supported by 2012 R2.
