Write a .vdi to a drive?

Znupi · Post by **Znupi** » 20. Mar 2009, 23:20

Would it be possible in any way to write a .vdi file (like an .iso file) to a drive? Especially an USB drive? Why I'm asking this is because I would like to configure some operating system (Archlinux?) in VirtualBox, put it ready configured on a stick and take it anywhere with me. Is that possible?

Znupi · Post by **Znupi** » 22. Mar 2009, 12:06

Anyone else think this could be a good idea? Maybe it could be done with the dd command?

Post by **vbox4me2** » 22. Mar 2009, 14:57

Its possible but it will run like a tbird on one cylinder.

Znupi · Post by **Znupi** » 22. Mar 2009, 16:23

vbox4me2 wrote:Its possible but it will run like a tbird on one cylinder.

Heh, funny! But why? Doesn't HAL detect hardware on start-up? And how would it be possible?

Post by **vbox4me2** » 22. Mar 2009, 16:57

This isn't hal related but performance, the VM hdd is nothing more then a file, you can use it just about anywhere.

Post by **Sasquatch** » 22. Mar 2009, 17:15

And if you put it on a USB drive, make sure that it supports big files. By default, USB drives are formatted with FAT or FAT32, which doesn't support files larger than 4 GB.

Znupi · Post by **Znupi** » 22. Mar 2009, 19:30

I know that the .vdi file is just a file and that you can use it on any machine, but not any machine has VirtualBox installed, and that wasn't the point of my question.
I was talking about writing the contents of the .vdi file (the actual filesystem) on the USB stick. That way, the stick would be formatted the right way (using the right filesystem), it would have a MBR, etc.

What I was thinking of trying was getting the offData of the .vdi (using vditool or similar) and then copying everything after {offData} bytes to the stick, using dd (on Linux). Is there some reason why this would not work at all?

Post by **vbox4me2** » 22. Mar 2009, 19:46

Aha a raw format, yes thats possible but not advicable since the moment you stick in a usb stick in a windows Host the Host will access it and possibly write to it. A raw format requires exclusive access or you run a very high risk of corruption.
See the manual about raw disks.

Znupi · Post by **Znupi** » 22. Mar 2009, 20:11

Ah thanks! Yes, that's close to what I was looking for, but I'll settle with it.
So will a Windows host actually try to write to it if it doesn't even recognize the filesystem? Sheesh, I better be careful, good thing I use Linux

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Write a .vdi to a drive?

Write a .vdi to a drive?

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