[Solved] HELP! Virtual Machine inaccessible!

[Lou Cipher]

Hi Everyone!

I don't know what happened today...I called Apple for support to see why my machine refused to Sleep and kept coming back on.

So, naturally they had me do some resets on the machine and then for some reason my Virtual Machine refused to start! I have a backup .vdi file from a month ago that I am trying to get VirtualBox to see however it refuses to do so and I do not know why??

I tried doing a Revert Snapshot and that did not work and now can't find the most recent virtual machine from earlier today so I seem to have lost 1 month of data assuming I can figure out a way to have VBox see an older .vdi file.

I thought that perhaps looking at the Machine uuid in the Windows XP.xml file would help however I have no clue how that ID is generated based on the .vdi file...??

So, if anyone knows how I can trick VirtualBox into using whatever .vdi file I want then perhaps I can use the machine state I saved from 1 month ago and make do with the data loss...

I would have had Time Machine on my Mac constantly back up my 60GB .vdi file however my 1TB back up drive then gets full in about 10 days so I need another way to constantly back up that file.

HELP!!!

[Perryg]

If you still have the .VDI file and you remember what the setting are that you had you can simply create another instance of it and then instead of creating a new HD you attach the one that you have. This should get you back to what is was when you backed it up.

[Lou Cipher]

Hi Perryg,

OMG - thanks for getting back to me so quickly - you SO ROCK!

I am really stuck and unable to use my machine and still really bummed I lost so much and still do not understand why.

Anyway, I am confused to how to proceed with the steps you outline here.

So, I do have a .VDI file right now - I have a few actually and trying to see which one is the most recent once I figure out how to attach them.

I tried to follow along with what you are saying however I do not know what you mean by creating another instance of "it" and attaching the HD I have already...?

Do I go to "Settings" of the current Virtual Machine and then "STORAGE" and then try and "ADD" a new "Hard Disk Attachment" and then "SELECT" the .vdi file that I think is my most recent one with all my data in it...?

When I try that, I keep getting an error saying "Failed to open the hard disk ***.vdi Cannot register the hard disk ***.vdi because a hard disk ***.vdi already exists in the media registry Virtualbox.xml"

So, perhaps I am doing the wrong steps to achieve what you are directing me to do below or perhaps I have to edit the .xml file...???

I apologize in advance for being a little clueless here...really sorry...

[Sasquatch]

When a VM becomes inaccessible, it usually means that the settings file is missing, or corrupt. Check the location where these settings are stored (no idea where on a Mac, maybe somewhere in /users/<username>/.Virtualbox?) and see if the config file exists there. If it doesn't, then it means you need to create a new VM ("it") and attach the existing VDI to it. It's even possible your snapshots are still there and usable.

[Lou Cipher]

Thanks so much guys - my .VDI is recovered after a few attempts and I am so grateful to have you guys here helping out someone in desperate need!!!!

And I LOVE VirtualBox - thank you!!

Joe

[coyotes]

Thanks for the solution post! Very helpful.