ProHVM Manual — Probus-IT

Overview

ProHVM (Probus-IT Hyper-V Manager) helps you manage Hyper-V servers and virtual machines from Windows. It is particularly useful on Core installations, where the built-in Microsoft Hyper-V Manager isn't available locally.

From a single console you can manage multiple versions of Hyper-V — from 2008 R2 through 2022 (and likely newer, untested). ProHVM runs on servers, desktops and Core installations, on both 32- and 64-bit Windows.

Installation

Download the installer from files/ProHVM.zip and run it. On a fresh installation you should also enable remote management on the Hyper-V host and reboot it.

Start ProHVM by typing hvm in a Command Prompt, or by clicking the icon in the Start menu.

Network: When managing a server remotely, make sure remote management is enabled and that WMI traffic is allowed through the firewall on both the server and the client.

Licensing

ProHVM is licensed per managed host. Managing one host from two clients counts as one license; managing two hosts requires two licenses.

ProHVM is now free. The product is no longer under active development, and the full feature set — including everything that used to require the Professional edition — is free, even for commercial use. Use the serial provided below to unlock the Pro features.

Editions

Historically ProHVM shipped in two editions. Both are now free.

Feature	Standard	Professional
Create and manage VMs	Yes	Yes
VM console access (also on free Microsoft Hyper-V Server)	Yes	Yes
Connect to Hyper-V hosts across domains and workgroups	Yes	Yes
Monitor VM CPU, memory and more	Yes	Yes
Monitor host CPU, memory, disks and event log	Yes	Yes
Import VMs	No	Yes
Export VMs	No	Yes
Storage migration	No	Yes
Cluster support (live and quick migrations)	No	Yes
Hyper-V Share Nothing migration	No	Yes
Hyper-V Replica support	No	Yes

Free Pro serial

To unlock the Professional features in ProHVM, apply the following serial:

2YTGGJ75I3-XDNWD23SWF-RVEG67HK3Q

The same serial can be applied to every host you manage — there is no per-host limit.

Apply a serial

Connect to the host by expanding it in the server tree.
Right-click the server and choose Settings from the popup menu.
In the Server tab of the Settings dialog, click Change serial.
Paste or type the serial, then click OK.
Confirm that the License type field has updated to reflect the new license.

User interface

ProHVM is designed to surface as much information as possible in a single main window, so you can do most day-to-day work managing your Hyper-V servers and VMs without switching tools.

ProHVM main window — Main window — server tree on top, details panel below.

The main window is split into two areas:

Server tree (top): lists the registered servers and, once you expand a server, its virtual machines.
Details panel (bottom): shows detailed information for the selected server or virtual machine.

Right-clicking any server or virtual machine opens a popup menu with the actions that can be performed on it.

Managing servers

Connecting to the local server

When ProHVM starts, it checks whether Hyper-V is installed on the local computer. If it is, the local computer is added to the server tree automatically, with [localhost] appended to its name.

Connecting to a remote server

To add a remote Hyper-V host, right-click the server tree and choose Add Server. Fill in the dialog:

Description — a friendly name that helps you identify the server.
Name or IP — the server name or IP address (for example 192.168.1.13, hv01 or hv01.domain.local).
Username — a user account with appropriate permissions on the server (Administrator, computer\Administrator, DOMAIN\Administrator).
Password — the password for that user.

Click OK to add the server. Expand the server node in the tree to connect.

Server info

Selecting a server in the tree displays CPU and memory information for that server in the details panel. From here you can open the Server Settings dialog, run a remote PowerShell session, and browse the host's disks.

Server Settings dialog

Right-click a server and choose Settings, or click the Settings button in the Server Info tab.

Server tab

Adjust connection settings and view licensing information. The serial for the host can also be changed here. ProHVM is licensed per host: a single license covers any number of clients connecting to that host, but each additional host you manage requires its own license.

Hyper-V Settings tab

Change the default folders where Hyper-V stores virtual machines and VHD files.

Event Log tab

Inspect the event log of the remote server. Pick a log from the dropdown, then double-click a record to view its details. The toolbar lets you filter event types via Logged Events, change the polling cadence with Refresh int., and control how many records are fetched with Nr. records. Click Apply to refresh.

Virtual Networks tab

View, add and remove virtual switches on the server. Switches fall into three categories:

External — VM to VM on the same host, VM to parent partition, and VM to externally located servers (in both directions).
Internal — VM to VM on the same host, and VM to parent partition.
Private — VM to VM on the same host only.

To add a switch, right-click the list and choose Add. Pick the switch type and — for External switches — the physical adapter to bind to.

Virtual Networks tab — Virtual Networks — External, Internal and Private switches.

Disks tab

Lists the disks present on the server. A Browse button opens a remote file browser where you can copy, paste, delete and rename files on the host's disks.

Live Migration tab

Enable or disable Hyper-V live migration and configure its settings.

Replication tab

Enable or disable Hyper-V Replica on the server and adjust its settings.

Information tab

General information about the server: OS, version, hostname, domain, CPU count, memory.

Managing virtual machines

Expand a server in the tree to see its virtual machines. Selecting a VM displays information about it in the details panel — a small preview of the VM screen, a CPU graph, and editable fields for name and notes.

VM summary in the details panel — VM details panel with live preview and CPU graph.

Creating a virtual machine

Right-click the server where you want to create the VM and choose New VM to open the wizard.

Step 1 — Name and location

Enter a name for the VM and pick a location for its configuration files.

New VM wizard step 1 — Step 1 — name and location.

Step 2 — Disk

Choose to create a new VHD or use an existing one. For new disks you can set the name, size, type and location, and optionally create a fixed-size disk.

Heads up: Creating a fixed-size disk can take a long time. The wizard can't attach the disk while it's being created, so you'll be offered the choice to wait or to continue. If you choose not to wait, attach the disk manually later.

New VM wizard step 2 — Step 2 — disk settings.

Step 3 — Other hardware

Specify the remaining hardware: an ISO file to attach to the DVD drive, the virtual switch to connect the network card to, and CPU and memory settings.

New VM wizard step 3 — Step 3 — DVD, network, CPU and memory.

Step 4 — Summary

Review the summary and click Finish to create the VM.

New VM wizard summary — Step 4 — summary.

Virtual machine actions

Right-clicking a virtual machine opens a popup menu of actions:

Start VM
Shutdown OS — gracefully shut down the guest OS (requires Integration Services).
Power off VM
Pause VM — the VM stops running but keeps its memory.
Suspend VM — saves state and releases memory to the host.
Reset VM
Snapshot — captures the VM state, data and hardware configuration.

From here you can also mount ISO files and connect to the VM console.

Connecting to / controlling a VM

To install an operating system or interact with a VM you'll often need a console session. Right-click a VM and choose Connect, or simply double-click it. Hold SHIFT while doing so to open the connection in cVM instead.

VM control window — VM console — toolbar with Connect, Smart sizing and Full Screen.

The toolbar at the top of the Control window gives you:

Close — closes the connection and the window.
Connect — connects or reconnects to the VM.
Smart sizing — toggles smart sizing.
Full Screen — switches the connection to full-screen mode.
CTRL+ALT+DEL — sends the key combination to the VM. The local representation can be changed in the Select hotkey dropdown; while in full screen, use the chosen combination to send CTRL+ALT+DEL to the guest.

Snapshots

Virtual machine snapshots capture the state, data and hardware configuration of a running VM. Snapshots offer a fast way to revert a VM to a previous state, which is mainly useful in development and test environments — for example to reproduce a specific problem state during troubleshooting.

To take a snapshot, right-click a VM and choose Snapshot, or select the VM and use the Snapshot tab in the details panel.

VM hardware settings

To add or change VM hardware, right-click the VM and choose Settings. The dialog lets you add, change and remove hardware including BIOS settings, memory, CPU count, hard disks (VHD, VHDX) and network cards (including legacy adapters).

VM Settings dialog — VM Settings — Add hardware on the left, configure on the right.

To add hardware, select Add hardware on the left and pick the type.
To change existing hardware, select it on the left, change the settings, then click Apply.

Managing clusters

From version 2.04, ProHVM supports managing clustered VMs. Operations include:

Quick migration
Live migration
Take resources online and offline
Add a VM to the cluster
Remove a VM from the cluster

cVM — Connect VM

cVM is a separate application for connecting to virtual machines. It can be started from inside ProHVM or directly from a Command Prompt with switches. On a free Microsoft Hyper-V Server (Core), cVM is the only way to connect to a VM's console.

cVM connection window — cVM showing a connected Windows guest.

Credentials: cVM does not support credentials pass-through. When you connect to a local server that has no credentials stored for it in ProHVM, you'll be prompted for a username and password. Tick Save credentials to reuse them for all future connections to VMs on that host.

To launch cVM from inside ProHVM, hold SHIFT and double-click a VM, or hold SHIFT and pick Connect from the VM's right-click menu.

To launch the cVM GUI, type cVM in a Command Prompt — the connection dialog opens.

cVM Connection Settings dialog — cVM connection dialog.

For an RDP session to a remote computer, fill in Host name or IP, username and password and click OK. To connect to a VM on a host, fill in the same fields, tick Connect to VM and pick the VM from the dropdown.

Local host: When connecting to the local Hyper-V host, use . as the host name and leave the username and password blank.

Using cVM switches

cVM can take every setting as a command-line switch. This makes it possible to create shortcuts to specific VMs or to connect to a VM at sign-in via the Startup folder or the registry.

Host — the computer to connect to, or the host of the VM.
Username — the user account to connect as.
Password — the password for that user.
port — connection port. Typically 3389 for RDP and 2179 for VM consoles.
VMName — the GUID of the VM (for example 13DFE6AD-BD6C-441A-8CFA-7FACBB41D702).
ElementName — the friendly name of the VM. VMName is recommended; using ElementName means cVM has to call Hyper-V to resolve the actual VM, which takes extra time.
FullScreen — set to 1 to start in full-screen mode (default 0).
PinConnectionBar — set to 1 to pin the connection bar (default 1).
StartVM — set to 1 to start the VM if it isn't already running (default 0).

The easiest way to assemble a switch line is to open cVM.exe, fill in the parameters in the connection dialog, and copy the contents of the CMD line field at the bottom. If you launch cVM from ProHVM by holding SHIFT while selecting Connect, most parameters are pre-filled.

cVM dialog with CMD line at the bottom — The CMD line field at the bottom of the cVM dialog.

To access the settings during an active connection, click Settings in cVM.

Passwords: If you copy the CMD line, the password will appear as Password="«YOURPASS»" — remember to replace it. If you're targeting the local Hyper-V host, also change the Host parameter to ..

Examples

Connect to a host using RDP:

cVM.exe Host="192.168.1.103" Username="Administrator" Password="Password"

Connect to a VM on the local Hyper-V server using VMName:

cVM.exe Host="." VMName="13DFE6AD-BD6C-441A-8CFA-7FACBB41D702"

Connect to a VM on the local Hyper-V host using ElementName in full-screen:

cVM.exe Host="." ElementName="MyVMFriendlyName" FullScreen=1

Connect to a remote Hyper-V server:

cVM.exe Host="192.168.1.103" Username="Administrator" Password="password" VMName="13DFE6AD-BD6C-441A-8CFA-7FACBB41D702" FullScreen="1" PinConnectionBar="0"