CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Discussions related to using VirtualBox on Windows hosts.
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

The release notes include a passage on building a VM starting with a cloned VDI.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "all_snapshots.vdi" etc. A snapshot is only a fragment of a disk image, useless by itself, which is precisely your problem. The clone VDI that CloneVDI creates are always complete, stand alone VDIs, even when made from snapshot fragments. So there can be no "all_snapshots" vs "clone_snapshots". If you cloned a snapshot chain starting from the latest snapshot fragment as the documentation instructed then the merged VDI already includes everything from the latest state of the virtual drive. A clone created from any earlier VDI, including the base VDI, does not contain the latest data.

As to how to create a VM from the VDI, that is in the release notes too. Create a new VM, and choose "use existing" when you get to the VDI creation step. I also have a tip: move the VDI into the newly created VM folder before choosing the VDI. This means the VDI starts off life exactly where it is supposed to be, making things simpler down the line.
webfrasse
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by webfrasse »

Hi!

I've been running CloneVDI for as long as it's been available and most of the time I've used it via Wine on my mac. Never any issues...until now when I'm on Catalina. It runs fine on Mojave but it fails to start on Catalina. Since Catalina doesn't support 32 bit apps I suspect that might be the issue.

$ wine64 CloneVDI.exe
wine64 CloneVDI.exe
0009:err:module:__wine_process_init L"Z:\\CloneVDI-exe-4.01\\CloneVDI.exe" not supported on this system
$ wine CloneVDI.exe
-bash: /usr/local/bin/wine: Bad CPU type in executable

Wine itself runs on my Catalina mac

$ wine
-bash: /usr/local/bin/wine: Bad CPU type in executable
$:CloneVDI-exe-4.01 mfransso$ wine64
Usage: wine PROGRAM [ARGUMENTS...] Run the specified program
wine --help Display this help and exit
wine --version Output version information and exit
$

Is it possible to have a 64 bit build?

Thanks
Mikael
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

webfrasse wrote: Is it possible to have a 64 bit build?
It may well take me a long time to get around to that, as it isn't required on the primary platform.

What you have there is a shortcoming with your installation of Wine, this is a major deviation from Windows compatibility. Is there no option in Wine to support 32bit Windows executables even when the host OS only supports 64bit versions of its own executables? It seems to me overkill (and unnecessarily risky) for Apple to have removed support for 32bit code pages entirely from the MacOS kernel.
aalguqha
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by aalguqha »

mpack wrote: I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "all_snapshots.vdi" etc. ...
What I meant by all_snapshots.vdi is the generated file by the CloneVDI. So, from what you said, to create the new VM, the generated VDI alone should be enough. In this case, we do not need to copy the entire VM folder (this folder has base VDI, Snapshots VDI and the clone one that is generated by the CloneVDI tool) to the local drive. This helps to save a lot of time as copying 500 GB will takes much less than 1.7 TB to the local drive. Thanks again for your help.
Last edited by mpack on 14. May 2020, 10:02, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Trim verbatim quote to useful size.
aalguqha
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by aalguqha »

I just tried using the clone VDI only and it worked perfectly. Thank you for this great tool.
Last edited by mpack on 14. May 2020, 10:01, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Delete unnecessary verbatim quote.
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

Thanks for reporting back.
Makarios
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by Makarios »

I have tried the VDI Clone and it initially gave a validation result error message that the VHD is not of the correct format..

I backed out and tried again and then the message is that the source file doen not exist. The source file is in the same c:\ folder of Wine on a linux mint machine.

I deleted the CloneVDI.ini and treid again, with the same result.

any suggestions?

Running A win 10 guest VDH ( 65GB) Host is linux Mint 19.3 and Virtual box 5.2.34

The
VM is a Normal(VDH) and Fixed size storage,,, I want to increase to 150GB and convert to VDI
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

All the ini file holds is your preferences for language and a couple of the dialog fields, so there's no point in deleting that again.

In general, don't thrash. You should know the effect of any move before you make it.

I'm not going to say much more without an accurate error message: but if CloneVDI tells you it isn't a VHD, then it isn't a VHD. If it says the file doesn't exist, then either you moved or deleted the file, or maybe you still had another instance of CloneVDI running.

Let's start with where the VHD came from?

 Edit:  I deleted all subsequent discussion of your problem since neither it nor your eventual solution are relevant in the "CloneVDI Discussion & Support" topic. This is NOT a general VM cloning topic, it is specifically for discussing the CloneVDI tool
caspertone
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by caspertone »

Thanks @mpack for this fantastic tool I love more and more every day, and more ever as I need to use its more new/advanced features.

I have two suggestions, a question and a petition.

First suggestion...
- some housekeeping. thread is so long that it is impossible to read in its entirety looking for something. Release notes PDF is good, perhaps could be called "User guide, FAQ and Release Notes". But the suggestion is to condense what is valid from all the thread (is it all in the release notes?) either to the release notes or to a howto or a wiki, close this thread and open a new one... I know, lot of work with "low added value"...

Second one (perhaps already covered in the long thread, items related to capacity include two pages (search.php?keywords=capacity&t=22422&sf=msgonly ) but I have not seen a similar suggestion:
- I have always to try to remember that when your tool says "virtual drive size" it is actually talking about what in the forum is usually called "virtual drive capacity", both to be the same for fixed (basic!) disks, but not for dynamic ones. While I know that size can be also applied (at the end of the day, a bottle size is equal to its capacity...) perhaps it would be more precise (exact?) that the tool asks for capacity, just a convention. Or that it asks for size for fixed disks and for capacity for dynamic ones... Sorry if this discussion has already happened. Besides, er, it would be more friendly to reword "increase virtual drive size" by "modify capacity/size of virtual drive"... specially for ones with saturated wetram...

Question
- Looks that size(capacity) selected by CloneVdi is not the same as shown in Virtual Media Adm. of VirtualBox and not the one shown in windows. I wonder it will be related to Gibabytes/Gibibytes ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibibyte ) - now I have it handly, but... is CloneVdi asking for GB or GiB?

Petition(s)
I am trying to convert a GPT dyanmic to MBR dynamic keeping its inside windows bootable. Seems that I need to go through fixed to do the change, not really an issue but quite long. I am not asking CloneVDI to automate all that thing (would be a fantastic niche product but I understand not compatible with your view of CloneVDI). But, one of the elements involved is choping off a lot of not needed information to go from 230GiB/GB capacity to 90, of course before converting to fixed for converting GPT to MBR. I failed to do it with CloneVDI (yes, you are very clear in the release notes about the chop of that results, I understand from the release notes that the last partition would never be chopped off (do you test that or how it goes) but that other content after will be done...
- Petition is to enhance a bit this part, that is, capacity/size reduction functions:
a) could you show which is the minimum capacity that will embody identified partitions?
b) do/could you plan to support check of not chopping off secondary header of GPT (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table )?
c) is current version, when reducing, "moving" GPT secondary header?

Thanks for your time!
CT
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by AnrDaemon »

caspertone wrote:I am trying to convert a GPT dyanmic to MBR dynamic keeping its inside windows bootable.
Fixed vs. dynamic is a VirtualBox characteristic, invisible from inside the VM. (Much like the number of plates in a rotary HD. 1 or 2, the disk works the same, if it has the same nominal capacity.)
Why so? Specifically, why do you convert GPT to MBR? Answering THAT may help better in your specific case.
Seems that I need to go through fixed to do the change
Definitely no.
But, one of the elements involved is choping off a lot of not needed information to go from 230GiB/GB capacity to 90, of course before converting to fixed for converting GPT to MBR.
You can reduce partition size under Windows. In disk manager, right-click the partition and pick the second option in the third group. It MAY have a confusing name in localized Windows (i.e. it's named "compress" in Russian), but in fact it will chop the space off the partition's end.
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

I find it somewhat ironic that, AFAIK, it was me who established the convention of describing the capacity of a hard drive as capacity (IME it was previously referred to as the "logical size"), and reserving "size" to refer to the current number of bytes in the host file. It was the act of developing CloneVDI that highlighted the need for clearer terminology: i.e. because prior to CloneVDI no tool even existed (*) to change the capacity of a VDI, which meant it wasn't exactly a big topic of conversation.

(*) The only related function provided by VBoxManage in 2009 was cloning, and it was command line only. There was no option to resize a drive. And even now the VBoxManage function is called "modifymedium --resize", not "modifymedium --newcapacity", so the "capacity" terminology is not universally acknowledged as superior, though obviously I do think so.

(**) Also, I refuse to pander to the GiB crowd. 1KB in a computing context means 1024 bytes, it has always meant 1024 bytes, there has never been any confusion except among people for whom confusion is a daily fact of life. Not helped by wilful disinformation such as drive mfrs quoting disk capacities in base 10 (computers don't have fingers, 10 has no special significance), because it makes it look like a larger capacity. I personally don't see how inserting an 'i' in the middle of GB will make it eternally immune from user ignorance. 1KB=1024. 1MB=1024^2. 1GB=1024^3. And so on.
wmeyer
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by wmeyer »

(**) Also, I refuse to pander to the GiB crowd. 1KB in a computing context means 1024 bytes, it has always meant 1024 bytes, there has never been any confusion except among people for whom confusion is a daily fact of life. Not helped by wilful disinformation such as drive mfrs quoting disk capacities in base 10 (computers don't have fingers, 10 has no special significance), because it makes it look like a larger capacity. I personally don't see how inserting an 'i' in the middle of GB will make it eternally immune from user ignorance. 1KB=1024. 1MB=1024^2. 1GB=1024^3. And so on.
Thank you! Accustomed to the perfectly logical conventional measure for over 40 years, I find the GiB mess just silly. Its proponents seem to think it brings clarity, but of course, it does nothing of the sort. If something needs fixing, it is arguably the designation of disk capacity used in marketing, which persists in using 1000 rather than 1024, because it provides more impressive numbers.
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by fth0 »

mpack wrote:1KB in a computing context means 1024 bytes, it has always meant 1024 bytes
FWIW, I also do not like or use the "modern" KiB. But unfortunately, the opposite is true when it comes to data rates:

1 kbit/s (or kbps) in a computing context means 1000 bit/s (or bps), and it has always meant 1000 bit/s (or bps). ;)

So you have to be careful when calculating the transmission time of any amount of data, for example:
Transfer 8 KB of data over an ISDN line (64 kbit/s), and it takes 1.024 seconds.
mpack
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by mpack »

Thanks guys, but that's enough on that subject here please.
caspertone
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Re: CloneVDI tool - Discussion & Support

Post by caspertone »

Sorry, I have been ill and could not come back.
AnrDaemon wrote:
caspertone wrote:I am trying to convert a GPT dyanmic to MBR dynamic keeping its inside windows bootable.
Fixed vs. dynamic is a VirtualBox characteristic, invisible from inside the VM. (Much like the number of plates in a rotary HD. 1 or 2, the disk works the same, if it has the same nominal capacity.)
Why so? Specifically, why do you convert GPT to MBR? Answering THAT may help better in your specific case.
Current VM has been created from real machine using Disk2VHD. So, MV booting disk is GPT. But I would like to have a "normal" VM, and delete non needed boot related partitions. In order to run the VM I had to select in settings, system, enably EFI. VM was able to boot, and creates a vram file. I do not understand what is behind all that and wish to move to know territory, i.e., MBR, usual boot, machine, no vram file. Windows 10 EFI booting under GPT is something I do not know, and vram file and so on is also uncharted territory for me. So, would be much more confortable moving to MBR. Happy to share the reasons, but I think this does not help to solve the GPT to MBR thing.

In any case, you are right, fixed or dynamic should be invisible inside the VM. I had not explained that my attack approach was another, I was mounting the vdi in the host and using tools at the host to change the mounted disk... that was the reason the tool is able to see that the mounted disk is dynamic. I had played with the idea to do it inside the guest, but I was unsure about the reaction of the tool to booting of the guest ... ususally those kind of partition/disk manipulation conveys booting, and I am not sure if the tool will react well to booting of the guest... But your point sparks trying this approach - do it inside the VM... seems obvious but I was to affraid to abandon the host perspective.
AnrDaemon wrote:
Seems that I need to go through fixed to do the change
Definitely no.
The point is ... how I change from GPT to MBR without deleting disk contents? I found that partition tools are able to change GPT to MBR but formating the disk (what a dumb thing, reformating the disk and formating in MBR should not be a mistery), but I only found a tool (I believe it is ... sorry for the commercial... Ea se us par ti ti on mas ter ) and that tool indicates that it only works with non dynamic disks...
Can you point to a tool (if possible cheap or affordable) that changes from GPT to MBR without loosing information and that more or less keps Windows 10 booting and works in dynamic disks? Either host or guest approach...

On the other hand, as said, I will dare to try to use the tool inside the VM.
AnrDaemon wrote:
But, one of the elements involved is choping off a lot of not needed information to go from 230GiB/GB capacity to 90, of course before converting to fixed for converting GPT to MBR.
You can reduce partition size under Windows. In disk manager, right-click the partition and pick the second option in the third group. It MAY have a confusing name in localized Windows (i.e. it's named "compress" in Russian), but in fact it will chop the space off the partition's end.
Reducing partition isnt an issue... but reducing vdi... needs CloneVdi or the manual alternative.
I got a new 2TB HW so this will not be either an issue...

So, thanks for the pointings. If you can name a tool for the GPT to MBR conversion not needing the change dynamic to fixed, either at host or guest level, you will make my day!

CT.
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