I'm looking to move my server to a VM in hyper-v running 2012 R2,however I plan to keep the same hardware I'm currently using for 2008 (64 bit).
I'd like to have a lab environment that i can test everything on prior to deploying it too.
Whats the best way to go about it?
I wouldn't mind configuring the base installation and the VM up from scratch, as it'd give me a chance to clean some things up. I would want to join the new VM to the domain though, then promote it to DC, so i don't have to create a new domain and join every machine to it. Is that possible while the old (2008) DC is offline?
I was thinking maybe i could just pop out the existing server drives, put in spares, install 2012 on those, build my VM, migrate my data, join domain (possible without DC online?), demote old DC, promote new one.
I've never really done anything like...