non-matching uuid

[ose]

Used an earlier version of VB successfully some years ago on Windows 7 PC.

Now installed Windows XP on VB version 7.14, also expansion pack.
Worked well - installed several programmes from disc on Windows XP, they worked well too. Saved several snapshots along the way.
Closed down with saved state. Now on attempting to restore, aborts loading of any snapshot or the saved state.

Gives this notification

rent UUID {00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} of the medium 'C:\Users\wares\VirtualBox VMs\Windows XP3\Snapshots/{fb60db8d-aa7e-4831-9637-278b00700c3e}.vhd' does not match UUID {503ed2a1-45c8-9c40-9c73-6c3a6fae50d7} of its parent medium stored in the media registry ('C:\Users\wares\.VirtualBox\VirtualBox.xml').
Result Code:
E_FAIL (0X80004005)
Component:
MediumWrap
Interface:
IMedium {ad47ad09-787b-44ab-b343-a082a3f2dfb1}

Please help.

[scottgus1]

Please go into C:\Users\wares\VirtualBox VMs\Windows XP3\, zip the file "Windows XP3.vbox" (note, not "Windows XP3.vbox-prev") and post the zip file using the forum's Attachments tab.

[ose]

My goodness that was quick! Thanks.

[scottgus1]

It's a little fuzzy for me, diagnosing snapshots. Hopefully a forum guru will come along.

Meanwhile, if you right-click the VM in the list and "Discard saved state", does the VM start? (Note that discarding the saved state will cause any data that wasn't saved to disk to be lost, and the VM OS will start as if it unexpectedly got the power cut off.)

[ose]

Thanks for trying. No it's greyed out.

[ose]

It would certainly be nice to be able to completely remove VB from my system. I have uninstalled VM and restarted my PC (several times) and redownloaded and reinstalled VM.0.14, and on first startup the rogue WXP VM is still there. When I delete it and try to install a new freshly downloaded WXP VHD, the Hard Disk Selector is already showing the previous VHD with a ! and I get the error

Cannot register the hard disk 'D:\Windows XP\WindowsXPMode_en-us\sources\xpm\VirtualXP.VHD' {503ed2a1-45c8-9c40-9c73-6c3a6fae50d7} because a hard disk 'D:\Windows XP\Windows XP files\sources\xpm\VirtualXP.VHD' with UUID {503ed2a1-45c8-9c40-9c73-6c3a6fae50d7} already exists.

This latter path has long been deleted and does not exist.
Please help me with doing a completely clean re-instal.

[scottgus1]

completely remove VB from my system. I have uninstalled VM and restarted my PC (several times) and redownloaded and reinstalled VM.0.14,

A little terminology: "Virtualbox" is the main app that runs the VMs. "VM" (or "guest") is the virtual machine run by Virtualbox.

This sounds like you want to uninstall Virtualbox. But the rest sounds like you only want to clear out the XP VM.

FWIW Virtualbox never had a version "VM.0.14", or in fact, a version called "VM.anything". Clarity in reporting is important.

************************

Cannot register the hard disk 'D:\Windows XP\WindowsXPMode_en-us\sources\xpm\VirtualXP.VHD' {503ed2a1-45c8-9c40-9c73-6c3a6fae50d7} because a hard disk 'D:\Windows XP\Windows XP files\sources\xpm\VirtualXP.VHD' with UUID {503ed2a1-45c8-9c40-9c73-6c3a6fae50d7} already exists.

You can only have one disk with the same UUID registered at a time. So you have to remove the old disk if you want to add another one.

With the snapshots, this replacement gets much trickier, and is best not to try.

If you want to start completely over with a new VM, remove the whole existing VM: In the main Virtualbox window, right-click the VM in the list and click Remove. The popup box will give you a chance to only remove the VM from Virtualbox, or to delete the whole VM permanently. a permanent delete is permanent, with no Recycle Bin recovery. Be careful which way you go.

And this time don't use snapshots or saved states. If you want to back up the VM, shut it down completely, then copy the whole VM folder containing the VM's .vbox file and the disk file to backup media. A restore is simply copying the backup back over the damaged original, after the VM is closed.

[ose]

A little terminology: "Virtualbox" is the main app that runs the VMs. "VM" (or "guest") is the virtual machine run by Virtualbox.

This sounds like you want to uninstall Virtualbox. But the rest sounds like you only want to clear out the XP VM.

FWIW Virtualbox never had a version "VM.0.14", or in fact, a version called "VM.anything". Clarity in reporting is important.

My apologies for writing VM instead of VB. Twice. Clever of you to spot it.

If you want to start completely over with a new VM, remove the whole existing VM: In the main Virtualbox window, right-click the VM in the list and click Remove. The popup box will give you a chance to only remove the VM from Virtualbox, or to delete the whole VM permanently. a permanent delete is permanent, with no Recycle Bin recovery. Be careful which way you go.

I've already done this. A few times.

The normal way of dealing with problematic software is to uninstall it, then start again from the beginning. There's no uninstall program supplied, so I use the Windows uninstall service. This clearly hasn't worked properly as there is still a lot if active stuff around probably including what's causing the problem; and I'm just looking for advice about completely removing all traces of the program from my computer so I can start again.

[scottgus1]

Uninstalling Virtualbox won't uninstall the VMs. Would kind of make upgrades rather hard if the VMs got deleted too, since an upgrade is really an uninstall/reinstall.

The VMs are to Virtualbox what pictures are to Paint or text files are to Notepad. The data files stay behind if the app gets uninstalled.

I've already done this. A few times.

The normal way of dealing with problematic software is to uninstall it,

Part of me says you've only been uninstalling Virtualbox, and have not actually tried removing the VM from the still-installed Virtualbox. Please confirm if I'm wrong and you actually have clicked Remove in the right-click-the-VM-in-the-list popup menu. I just did it myself and what I wrote works to clear a VM from Virtualbox so you won't get those "can't register" errors.

[ose]

I've spent so much time on it I'm not entirely sure. I've certainly "removed all files" a few times without solving the problem, but may not have done it immediately before reinstalling. I had a number of failed projects with different names, the only common factor being the original VirtualXP.VHD extracted from the Windows packet. (but I re-downloaded this too). So you're probably right.

Anyway (I think) I've sussed it. I uninstalled the programme (I was wrong - there was an Oracle uninstall service) and had to manually delete 2 VB-related processes in Task Manager, then deleted the .Vbox and Vbox VMs folders. Didn't do these last 2 things before. Not sure which made the difference. Seems OK now.

Hope this is helpful. Thanks for your input.

[ose]

Not fully sussed. It's back again. Had been working perfectly, snapshots, saving state and all the rest. Just before it happened I found a duplicate Virtualbox Manager window on the console. Not sure when that arrived (I've a lot of windows open), but I have noticed it happen before. Two VB Manager windows identical. I deleted one of them without thinking, I think while the VM was running, and after that the failure error returned next time I stopped (save state) and restarted it.

Head scratcher number 2: I then made a Clone of the faulty VM . . . . which works pefectly.

Don't know if you can make any sense of this.

[scottgus1]

It is possible to have more than one Virtualbox manager window open. This especially happens when you add a VM to the manager by double-clicking the .vbox file.

There is one other way to reset an existing Virtualbox:
Reboot the host so no Virtualbox processes are running.
Move the C:\Users\{youraccount}\.Virtualbox folder (note the period in the name) to the Desktop.
Start Virtualbox.
The manager window will open with no VMs registered. The Virtual Media Manager will have no disks showing. All settings will be reset.
You can add the VMs you want back in using the Machine menu, Add.
As long as the XP VHD disk you have hasn't been added to Virtualbox already as part of a registered VM, you can add that disk. (You can't add two disks with the same UUID.

Mpack's CloneVDI can clone the VHD to a VDI with a new UUID. The clones can co-exist on the Virtualbox manager, because they are different UUIDs.

[ose]

No, there's no sensible reason for there to be 2 identical windows containing the same material at the same time. I've never had more than one VM loaded at the same time. In this case, one or other of them seems to have appeared spontaneously.

And what's the difference between an established VM and its clone? Sensible answer: none. Actual answer: one works and the other doesn't. This should give a strong clue as to what's gone wrong. It can't be normal behaviour.