Inaccessible VM, <VM-name>.vbox Missing

[mpack]

The only thing I see that we can do is clone the base disk and snapshots, if we can find them, to a single non-snapshotted disk file using Mpack's CloneVDI, then letting the guest use this new disk.

If you are going to do then I would strongly recommend wrapping a new VM around the clone. Trying to drop a stand-alone VDI into a confusingly snapshot-ridden existing VM will probably just create more confusing time bombs.

[scottgus1]

Actually, the .vbox that went with this guest was about half-way hosed and did not have any snapshot info in it - didn't even have the disk controller & vdi file attached - but still had the machine UUID. I cobbled together some stuff from a previous clone of the guest that was still working and added in the base disk. It did boot, but I'll try to get the OP to be sure he has good backups.

[DW55]

It would probably have been better to let me know you had snapshots before starting the guest.

I didn't realize you needed that info before I followed your instructions in that post. Sorry I complicated the recovery.

All my apps can be reinstalled from their original sources and most of my data was backed up. Let's drop all attempts to recover any of the snapshots. The VM10 guest is fine as is, and I thank you for that.

After my last post, while the VM10 guest was idling, I saw that Windows Update had started on its own. I had not asked for the update. In fact, I didn't use the VM at all except to confirm that it could launch and that it was a 64x Windows 10 Pro version 1511 machine without any of my apps or data. I allowed the update to run to completion. It installed Creators Update completely and I shut down the VM.

I think the restoration of the VM10 guest has clobbered the VM10 Clone guest. When I try to start VM10 Clone, I get the message, "FATAL: Could not read from the boot medium! System halted". The VM10_true_Clone is still running fine. I'm not sure whether the restoration of the VM10 guest clobbered the VM10 Clone guest or the Windows Update did it. I'm including here below some directory listings that may be of help. The first two listings are of the current state of my physical machine. The third listing is the backup directories I made yesterday.

Current state:

Code: Select all

C:\WINDOWS\system32>dir /s C:\"Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10"
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 12F9-C4BD

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10

07/18/2017  01:12 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:12 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:11 PM    <DIR>          Logs
07/18/2017  01:12 PM             7,778 VM10.vbox
07/18/2017  05:54 AM             7,778 VM10.vbox-prev
07/18/2017  01:12 PM    34,179,383,296 VM10.vdi
               3 File(s) 34,179,398,852 bytes

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10\Logs

07/18/2017  01:11 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:11 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:12 PM           115,941 VBox.log
07/18/2017  05:54 AM           150,965 VBox.log.1
07/18/2017  01:54 AM           102,299 VBox.log.2
07/06/2017  09:17 PM            92,818 VBox.log.3
07/18/2017  01:12 PM           382,022 VBoxHardening.log
07/07/2017  02:18 AM            23,279 VBoxHardening.zip
               6 File(s)        867,324 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
               9 File(s) 34,180,266,176 bytes
               5 Dir(s)  36,149,817,344 bytes free

Current state:

Code: Select all

C:\WINDOWS\system32>dir /s D:\VirtualMachine
 Volume in drive D is D Drive 1 TB
 Volume Serial Number is A667-EFC7

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine

07/08/2017  02:36 PM    <DIR>          .
07/08/2017  02:36 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          VM10 Clone
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          VM10_true_Clone
               0 File(s)              0 bytes

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone

07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          Logs
07/04/2017  02:30 AM    <DIR>          Snapshots
07/18/2017  01:15 PM             2,281 VM10 Clone.vbox
07/18/2017  01:08 PM             2,281 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
01/16/2017  03:03 PM    73,420,242,944 VM10 Clone.vdi
               3 File(s) 73,420,247,506 bytes

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\Logs

07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:15 PM            92,361 VBox.log
07/18/2017  01:08 PM            93,422 VBox.log.1
07/17/2017  03:20 AM           130,319 VBox.log.2
07/16/2017  01:04 PM           130,944 VBox.log.3
07/18/2017  01:15 PM           367,723 VBoxHardening.log
               5 File(s)        814,769 bytes

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\Snapshots

07/04/2017  02:30 AM    <DIR>          .
07/04/2017  02:30 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/17/2017  03:20 AM    19,172,163,584 {5a1da204-7009-4fb7-90e3-5770f4be8268}.vdi
07/04/2017  02:30 AM    33,630,978,048 {d69c1c87-5658-462d-9ae0-751d5dea4052}.vdi
               2 File(s) 52,803,141,632 bytes

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10_true_Clone

07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:12 PM    <DIR>          Logs
07/18/2017  01:15 PM             7,342 VM10_true_Clone.vbox
07/14/2017  04:46 AM             7,342 VM10_true_Clone.vbox-prev
07/18/2017  01:15 PM    73,704,407,040 VM10_true_Clone.vdi
               3 File(s) 73,704,421,724 bytes

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10_true_Clone\Logs

07/18/2017  01:12 PM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  01:12 PM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  01:15 PM           125,658 VBox.log
07/14/2017  04:46 AM           130,787 VBox.log.1
07/13/2017  09:04 PM           119,807 VBox.log.2
07/13/2017  08:50 PM           119,039 VBox.log.3
07/18/2017  01:15 PM           382,249 VBoxHardening.log
               5 File(s)        877,540 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
              18 File(s) 199,929,503,171 bytes
              17 Dir(s)  236,994,084,864 bytes free

Backed up Monday, July 17th:

Code: Select all

C:\WINDOWS\system32>dir /s H:\"VirtualBox VMs"
 Volume in drive H is Acer 596GB
 Volume Serial Number is F2D2-F979

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          VM10
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          VM10 Clone
               0 File(s)              0 bytes

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          Logs
07/06/2017  09:06 PM             2,127 VM10.vbox-prev
07/28/2016  05:08 AM    19,228,786,688 VM10.vdi
               2 File(s) 19,228,788,815 bytes

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10\Logs

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/06/2017  09:17 PM            92,818 VBox.log
07/06/2017  09:06 PM            92,765 VBox.log.1
07/06/2017  08:55 PM            92,312 VBox.log.2
07/06/2017  08:49 PM            64,988 VBox.log.3
07/06/2017  09:17 PM           368,953 VBoxHardening.log
07/07/2017  02:18 AM            23,279 VBoxHardening.zip
               6 File(s)        735,115 bytes

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          Logs
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox
12/30/2016  05:27 PM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
               2 File(s)         14,338 bytes

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\Logs

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             1,498 VBox.log
12/30/2016  05:28 PM             1,497 VBox.log.1
07/28/2016  06:04 AM             1,528 VBox.log.2
12/31/2016  05:29 AM           303,340 VBoxHardening.log
               4 File(s)        307,863 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
              14 File(s) 19,229,846,131 bytes
              14 Dir(s)  526,889,504,768 bytes free

Please LMK if you need any other info to enable the restoration of the VM10 Clone guest.

Thank you for your help,

DW

[scottgus1]

I didn't see anything in the "VM10 clone.vbox" file you posted yesterday that indicated that VM10 Clone was a linked clone. It looks like a stand-alone guest to me. The second directory listing shows what appears to be an intact VM10 clone.vbox and matching vdi file.

Running Updates in one stand-alone guest will not stop another stand-alone guest from working, unless you run out of host disk space. Check that you didn't accidentally remove the hard drive file from the VM10 Clone.

If you are content with the original VM10 without snapshots, then we can proceed to moving the guest to the D drive. See Moving a VM.

Also, this question from earlier:

How to display the menu bar in full screen mode?

The menu bar should be there unless you are in scaled mode. Host-C toggles scaled mode on/off. When scaled mode is on, the menu bar is not visible. Press Host-C until the menu bar appears. However, since you were using snapshots, chances are you had installed the Guest Additions in the guest after a snapshot. Guest Additions are necessary to have the guest OS change its screen size to fit the Virtualbox window it is running in. You probably don't have the Guest Additions installed now in the guest you're booting.

And I would recommend to not use snapshots in the future for important guests, take backups instead. The "Moving a VM" tutorial also works well re-interpreted as "Backing Up a VM".

[DW55]

Hi scottgus1,

I didn't see anything in the "VM10 clone.vbox" file you posted yesterday that indicated that VM10 Clone was a linked clone.

That's correct. VM10 Clone is not a linked clone. In fact, it is a clone in name only. I did not use the Clone menu item in VB Manager when I created it. Instead, it was a new guest that I named "VM10 Clone". In future, I'll use more accurate names and I will not include blank spaces in the names.

Running Updates in one stand-alone guest will not stop another stand-alone guest from working, unless you run out of host disk space.

I still have 33.6 gigs free on my C drive, but the VM10 Clone guest is installed on the D drive which still has 220 gigs free. I don't think the Windows Update clobbered VM10 Clone. I think that happened when VM10 guest was recovered. What do you need to see in order to recover VM10 Clone?

Check that you didn't accidentally remove the hard drive file from the VM10 Clone.

What is the name and full path of the hard drive file for VM10 Clone? Is it not shown in the directory listings I supplied earlier today? That file is still at "D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vdi". Here's the current directory listing:

Code: Select all

C:\WINDOWS\system32>dir "D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vdi"
 Volume in drive D is D Drive 1 TB
 Volume Serial Number is A667-EFC7

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone

01/16/2017  03:03 PM    73,420,242,944 VM10 Clone.vdi
               1 File(s) 73,420,242,944 bytes
               0 Dir(s)  235,819,671,552 bytes free

If you are content with the original VM10 without snapshots, then we can proceed to moving the guest to the D drive.

Yes, quite content with the current state of VM10. Thank you for the link to Moving a VM. Let's do that after we recover VM10 Clone.

Guest Additions are necessary to have the guest OS change its screen size to fit the Virtualbox window it is running in. You probably don't have the Guest Additions installed now in the guest you're booting.

When I start VM10_true_Clone, I am in scaled mode and the menu bar is not visible, but when I click the up arrow in the system tray, I do see an icon representing Guest Additions 5.1.22. When I double-click the icon or right-click it, the icon is unresponsive (maybe that's normal behavior). The CD drive (D:) is empty. My guess is that I can get the Guest Additions ISO to show in the CD drive if I run Oracle_VM_VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-5.1.22-115126.vbox-extpack again. Please confirm that the icon in system tray is sufficient evidence that Guest Additions are already installed in VM10_true_Clone.

When I start VM10, the Guest Additions icon is visible in the system tray and the CD drive (D:) does contain the Guest Additions ISO. I have not run the ISO file in the VM10 guest yet.

All three of my VMs have no snapshots now. IOW, both VM10 Clone and VM10_true_Clone each had at least one snapshot before VM10 was restored, and now no snapshots are visible/accessible in any of the VMs. Let's not try to recover any snapshots.

To summarize:
No need to recover snapshots for any of the three VMs.
In future, I will use snapshots only sparingly. I'll back up the entire folder for important VMs instead.
I would like to recover VM10 Clone.
Let's follow up on the menu bar after all three VMs are running normally.
Let's move VM10 from the C drive to the D drive after we recover VM10 Clone.

Thank you again,

DW

[scottgus1]

Sorry, DW, I didn't see the scroll bar on the directory listings you posted on the 18th, the VM10 Clone.vdi is still in the correct folder.

However, "FATAL: Could not read from the boot medium! System halted" means there are no bootable disks attached to the guest. I suspect that you may have accidentally removed that disk file from the guest's settings. Go to the main Virtualbox window, then the guest's Storage settings. Check the guest's SATA controller. Under that controller should be the drive file VM10 Clone.vdi. If it isn't there, connect it back, same way as you did for the original VM10 guest we fixed earlier.

[DW55]

Hi scottgus1,

Go to the main Virtualbox window, then the guest's Storage settings. Check the guest's SATA controller.

When I edit Storage for VM10 Clone in the GUI, the storage tree was completely empty -- no controller and no Guest Additions. I clicked the "Adds new storage controller" (plus sign) icon and now one SATA controller is in the storage tree and its port count is 0. Rather than thrash around blindly, I am asking you how to proceed. Should I do anything to get Guest Additions to show up in the storage tree? There is no .vdi file in the C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\ folder. Here below are directory listings of the current VM10 Clone folder as well as a listing of a backup made on July 18th which is stored on my H drive (external enclosure).

Current VM10 Clone directory:

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir /s C:\"Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone"
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 12F9-C4BD

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone

12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          .
12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          Logs
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox
12/30/2016  05:27 PM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
               2 File(s)         14,338 bytes

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\Logs

12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          .
12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             1,498 VBox.log
12/30/2016  05:28 PM             1,497 VBox.log.1
07/28/2016  06:04 AM             1,528 VBox.log.2
12/31/2016  05:29 AM           303,340 VBoxHardening.log
               4 File(s)        307,863 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
               6 File(s)        322,201 bytes
               5 Dir(s)  36,303,941,632 bytes free

Backup made on July 18th:

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir /s H:\"VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone"
 Volume in drive H is Acer 596GB
 Volume Serial Number is F2D2-F979

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          Logs
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox
12/30/2016  05:27 PM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
               2 File(s)         14,338 bytes

 Directory of H:\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\Logs

07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          .
07/18/2017  12:50 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             1,498 VBox.log
12/30/2016  05:28 PM             1,497 VBox.log.1
07/28/2016  06:04 AM             1,528 VBox.log.2
12/31/2016  05:29 AM           303,340 VBoxHardening.log
               4 File(s)        307,863 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
               6 File(s)        322,201 bytes
               5 Dir(s)  526,889,504,768 bytes free

What is causing the deletion of my .vdi files? I am definitely not deleting them intentionally, and I don't think I'm deleting them accidentally. I always close a guest by using Winkey > Power > Shut down or the equivalent Winkey+X U U.

I used the Recuva tool from http://www.piriform.com/recuva to search for any .vdi files, but none were found.

I notice that a newer version of Virtual Box is available, but I think I should defer the update until the VM10 Clone guest is restored.

Your advice, please.

DW

[scottgus1]

Something kind of eclectic is going on. The "Virtualbox.xml" you posted a few days ago says the VM10 Clone.vbox file that it was using as the VM10 Clone guest is on the D drive: "D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox". (You can open your Virtualbox.xml in Wordpad.)

And the directory listings you posted here shows two folders for VM10 clone: a C drive folder and a D drive folder. The D drive folder contains a complete VM10 Clone guest with the .vbox and the .vdi and other files, and the usage dates for the D drive files are more recent than the C drive files:

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir C:\"Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\"
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 12F9-C4BD

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone

12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          .
12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/31/2016  05:29 AM    <DIR>          Logs
12/31/2016  05:29 AM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox
12/30/2016  05:27 PM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
               2 File(s)         14,338 bytes
               3 Dir(s)  51,773,612,032 bytes free

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir D:\"VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone"
 Volume in drive D is D Drive 1 TB
 Volume Serial Number is A667-EFC7

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone

07/08/2017  05:37 AM    <DIR>          .
07/08/2017  05:37 AM    <DIR>          ..
07/08/2017  01:19 AM    <DIR>          Logs
07/04/2017  02:30 AM    <DIR>          Snapshots
07/08/2017  01:19 AM            21,076 VM10 Clone.vbox
07/07/2017  05:05 AM            21,076 VM10 Clone.vbox-prev
07/08/2017  05:37 AM            21,091 VM10 Clone.vbox-tmp
01/16/2017  03:03 PM    73,420,242,944 VM10 Clone.vdi
               4 File(s) 73,420,306,187 bytes
               4 Dir(s)  305,428,692,992 bytes free

It appears that the C drive files aren't being used, and the D drive files are your guest.

Open your Virtualbox.xml in Wordpad, then look for the <MachineRegistry> block. This data looked like this in the Virtualbox.xml you posted:

Code: Select all

    <MachineRegistry>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{4e074c96-bccb-4122-9038-a00df5dcdaa1}" src="C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10\VM10.vbox"/>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{324bb43c-f900-49bb-8e32-11f83ec0447d}" src="D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox"/>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{4f95ecc2-a67d-4172-9c52-18391b75ec52}" src="D:\VirtualMachine\VM10_true_Clone\VM10_true_Clone.vbox"/>
    </MachineRegistry>

In your present Virtualbox.xml, notice the path you now have for VM10 Clone.vbox. What does your path to VM10 CLone.vbox say? Can you copy the <MachineRegistry> block out of your present Virtualbox.xml and post it in Code tags, please?

[DW55]

Hi scottgus1,

What does your path to VM10 CLone.vbox say?

I see the VM10 Clone.vbox file in two places as follows here:

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir C:\"Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox"
Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 12F9-C4BD

 Directory of C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10 Clone

12/31/2016  05:29 AM             7,169 VM10 Clone.vbox
               1 File(s)          7,169 bytes
               0 Dir(s)  36,528,394,240 bytes free

And here:

Code: Select all

C:\Users\RAS>dir "D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox"
 Volume in drive D is D Drive 1 TB
 Volume Serial Number is A667-EFC7

 Directory of D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone

07/18/2017  01:15 PM             2,281 VM10 Clone.vbox
               1 File(s)          2,281 bytes
               0 Dir(s)  244,809,945,088 bytes free

Can you copy the <MachineRegistry> block out of your present Virtualbox.xml and post it

Here's the <MachineRegistry> block from "C:\Users\RAS\.VirtualBox\VirtualBox.xml" created Thursday, ‎July ‎28, ‎2016, ‏‎3:41:16 AM, Modified ‎July ‎20, ‎2017 2:42 AM with Size: 2.80 KB (2,871 bytes), Size on disk: 4.00 KB (4,096 bytes).

Code: Select all

    <MachineRegistry>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{4e074c96-bccb-4122-9038-a00df5dcdaa1}" src="C:\Users\RAS\VirtualBox VMs\VM10\VM10.vbox"/>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{324bb43c-f900-49bb-8e32-11f83ec0447d}" src="D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox"/>
      <MachineEntry uuid="{4f95ecc2-a67d-4172-9c52-18391b75ec52}" src="D:\VirtualMachine\VM10_true_Clone\VM10_true_Clone.vbox"/>
    </MachineRegistry>

I hope this helps.

Thank you,

DW

[scottgus1]

Yes it does, thanks! This line from the Virtualbox.xml:

Code: Select all

<MachineEntry uuid="{324bb43c-f900-49bb-8e32-11f83ec0447d}" src="D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone\VM10 Clone.vbox"/>

shows that the D drive VM10 Clone is the active machine. The C drive VM10 Clone files are old. If the VM10 Clone guest in the main Virtualbox window was showing no SATA controller or hard disk or CD drive, then in some fashion it got deleted accidentally, probably while we were trying to add VM10's hard drive back. I suspect that at some point you were in VM10 Clone's settings when you thought you were in VM10.

No matter, it's easy to fix. You have already added a new storage controller, good. Now click the storage controller and add a hard disk. Choose Existing Disk, and browse to D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone, then select and add "VM10 Clone.vdi". If you get errors, see below. If you don't get errors, then be sure the hard drive is shown on port 0 in the right pane. Then add a CD drive on port 1, and leave it empty. If you have already installed the Guest Additions in this guest, then you do not need to put the Guest Additions ISO in the virtual CD drive. If you need to install GAs, start the guest, then when it is booted and logged on, in the guest window's menu bar, choose Devices -> Insert Guest Additions Image. This puts the GA "CD" in your guest's CD drive. If Autoplay doesn't start the GA installer, open the guest's CD drive window and start the setup.exe manually. Once the setup is complete, remove the Guest Additions ISO by choosing the Devices menu, Optical Drives, Remove Disk.

If you do get errors attaching the VM10 Clone.vdi file to the controller, it will probably be that there is already a hard disk in the Virtualbox system called VM10 Clone.vdi with the same UUID. If that is the error, cancel the changes to the guest's settings and go to the main Virtualbox window File Menu, Virtual Media Manager. On the Hard Disks tab, find the VM10 Clone.vdi in the list of files and select it. In the bottom pane, see if anything is listed in "Attached To:". If one of your guests besides VM10 Clone is shown there, then you have somehow attached the wrong disk to the other guest. If so, stop and post back what you see. If "Attached To:" reads Not Attached then you can click Release on the toolbar above, then Remove. Remove will confirm if you want to remove, click Remove. Then you will be asked if you want to keep or delete the hard disk. Click Keep, not Delete, for obvious reasons . There is no recovery from Delete, be careful. Close the Media Manager. Then go back to the VM10 Clone guest Storage settings as shown above and try to attach the D drive vdi file again. It should go in this time.

If you get a different error trying to attach the vdi to the controller, post the error here.

[DW55]

Hi scottgus1,

Thank you for staying with me on this problem. I think we're making progress but I did run into a snag.

Now click the storage controller and add a hard disk. Choose Existing Disk, and browse to D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone, then select and add "VM10 Clone.vdi".

When I click the storage controller in the "Storage tree", I don't see a "hard disk" option. Instead, I selected Add IDE.

When I choose "Existing Disk", and browse to D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone and add "VM10 Clone.vdi", I get no errors. However, I don't see any way to select a port number in the right pane. Instead, under "Attributes", I see Name: IDE and Type: PIIx4.

Note: "Use Host I/O Cache already had a checkmark in it. I kept the checkmark in the checkbox.

I was able to right-click the SATA controller and Add optical drive on port 1. I left it empty.

I tried to start the VM10 Clone guest. A light blue "Recovery" window came up. It said:

There isn't enough memory available to create a ramdisk device.
Error code: 0xc0000017
Press Enter to try again.
Press F8 forStartup settings

I pressed Enter and got the same error screen again. I pressed F8 and got nine options such as "Enable debugging" and several Safe Modes etc. I didn't take any of the options. Instead, I pressed Enter and got back to the original light blue "Recovery" window as described above. I clicked the X icon in upper right of the screen and clicked "Power off the machine".

To avoid any complications, I haven't tried to start any of the three guests except VM10 Clone as described above.

What info do you need from me now?

DW

[scottgus1]

I was able to right-click the SATA controller and Add optical drive on port 1.

If I'm reading right, you have a SATA controller on VM10 Clone. I see in my instructions I said "Click on the SATA controller" - Sorry, should have been "right-click". When I right-click on a SATA controller for one of my guests, a popup menu appears with 'Add Optical Drive', 'Add Hard Disk', 'Remove Controller'. Although when the controller is just clicked, on my VB there are two icons at the end, one of which tooltips as 'Adds hard disk'.

Switching the boot disk to new hardware (the IDE controller) before the guest OS knows that new hardware is present may confuse 10. I think just putting the disk back on the SATA controller should get things going again. Remove the disk from the IDE, delete the IDE controller, and add the disk to the SATA.

IDE only has four ports, not numbered. You will see the SATA port number choices once you have the disk attached to the SATA controller, then select the disk.

[DW55]

Hi scottgus1,

When I right-click on a SATA controller for one of my guests, a popup menu appears with 'Add Optical Drive', 'Add Hard Disk', 'Remove Controller'.

I get the same thing. I didn't see the right-click option previously.

To get a fresh start, in the Storage tree, I removed everything except the SATA controller. I removed the disk from the IDE, deleted the IDE controller, and added the hard disk to the SATA controller. I browsed to D:\VirtualMachine\VM10 Clone and added "VM10 Clone.vdi" and confirmed the HDD is on SATA Port 0.

I was able to right-click the SATA controller and Add optical drive on port 1. I left it empty.

I tried to start the VM10 Clone guest. The light blue "Recovery" window came up. It said:

There isn't enough memory available to create a ramdisk device.
Error code: 0xc0000017
Press Enter to try again.
Press F8 for Startup settings

I closed this window using the X in upper right corner and powered off the machine. Then I clicked Settings > System and, on the Motherboard tab, I moved the slider to 8000MB.

On my next start attempt, I got the "Recover" windows again with:

Your PC/Device needs to be repaired
Error code 0xc0000225.

I closed this window using the X in upper right corner and powered off the machine. I didn't make any attempt to check on the installation of guest additions.

To confirm the other two guests are still intact, I started VM10 and VM10_true_Clone in turn one-at-a-time. As soon as Windows booted up completely, I shut down each guest. They both appear to be healthy.

My current situation is the VM10 Clone guest is still not booting up normally. It has the 0xc0000225 error as described above.

What is the next troubleshooting step?

Thank you for your continuing help.

DW

[socratis]

Error code: 0xc0000017

Error code: 0xc0000225

Both of these are Windows specific error codes. Search for them in Google for the appropriate Windows fixes. This is not a VirtualBox problem anymore.

[scottgus1]

I would agree with Socratis; if you are getting Windows-generated screens and errors inside a Virtualbox guest window, that means that Virtualbox is working, the guest OS is attempting to run, and you now have to fix the OS inside the guest using the usual fix-the-OS (ie. Google) methods.

You could use usual Windows methods to repair the OS. If this guest has data on it that you want to get off, then you can attach the VM10 Clone.vdi to another working guest as a second hard drive, and boot that guest to get the data. Be sure to detach the VM10 Clone.vdi from the other guest after you get the data off.

You can move the VM10 guest to the D drive using this tutorial: Moving a VM also good interpreted as Backing Up a VM.