The current state of art - wait for file copy to complete before provisioning the VM
Virtualization related storage files (VHD, VMDK etc.) typically range in size from tens of GBs to hundreds of GBs. Copying such large files can tax a server bus, performance of other running VMs, as well as network performance.

Unfortunately, many of the usage scenarios for Virtual Machines directly lead to a file copy and current technology requires the file copy to complete before a VM . Some examples:

• A primary data center goes off line and a recent backup available at a secondary site is potentially the last remaining data copy. Prudent practices call for making a copy of the VHD and then provisioning a VM with the copy
• Checking out a VM from a management solution such as System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM). This can lead a VHD file copy operation and one has to wait until the file copy has completed before the VM can be provisioned and utilized. Note that Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 based Clustered Shared Volumes encourage placing multiple VHDs on a single volume. This increases the likelihood that VM provisioning will be done via a file copy, rather than a SAN LUN transfer. A SAN LUN transfer would move all  the recommended 4-8 VHDs on the LUN from an SCVMM Library Share to a Hyper-V host.

What's wrong with the current state of the art
The current solutions lead to a number of inefficiencies:

• The admin has to wait until a VM file copy is complete before the VM can be booted.
• Meaningless data is copied.
• Data is copied, and then immediately overwritten e.g. a VM provisioning can involve a file copy, and once the VM is provisioned, the admin installs some new software. This new software overwrites a significant part of the data that was copied during the VM provisioning.

The Solution - VMProv - a command line utility
VMProv is based upon the patent pending technology that allows a VM to be provisioned as soon as the VHD file copy begins. This means that the VM can start booting in seconds and is available sooner to meet business continuity needs. You can install software inside the VM, or do anything you can with a regularly provisioned VM. All changes made to the VM while the file copy is happening are preserved.

VMProv leads to some distinct advanatges:

• Any backup can be turned into an instant Disaster Recovery solution.
• A lot of useless disk I/O that affects admin productivity and adverseley affects other running VMs can be avoided. For example, an admin would normally checkout a 160 GB VHD, and wait for 120GB worth of zeros to be written. Then the admin would install SQL and associated data inside the VM which would overwrite 100GB worth of zeros with data. With VMProv, the SQL installation can start much sooner. So potentially, the 100GBs worth of data is written first, and when VMProv finishes cloning the VM, only 20GBs worth of zeros need to be written.

VMprov is designed to be used with Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager R2 and its Rapid Provisoning feature.  VMProv is also designed to complement Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager and turn the VHD it produces at a secondary site into an instant DR solution.