virtualbox.org

I am running Win XP as a guest. During the initialization of the HDD for my guest I initialized only 8 GB, which is running low. Is there a way I can increase the size of the HD on the guest without re-installing it?

Read all about it here.
CloneVDI Tool

If you don't want to bother with an external tool, it's fairly easy to do with VBoxManage clonehd.

The process is described here: http://www.alittletothewright.com/2009/ ... amic-vdis/

JshWright wrote:If you don't want to bother with an external tool, it's fairly easy to do with VBoxManage clonehd.

External... you mean like VBoxManage? I would also quibble with your definition of "easy" - IMHO someone would have to be nuts to follow that procedure when it can be done in one step in a fraction of the time that procedure requires.

The article is interesting however in showing the use of the "--existing" option with "VBoxManage clonehd". The user manual I have (3.0.8 ) mentions that option but does not document its purpose.

mpack wrote:External... you mean like VBoxManage? I would also quibble with your definition of "easy" - IMHO someone would have to be nuts to follow that procedure when it can be done in one step in a fraction of the time that procedure requires.

The article is interesting however in showing the use of the "--existing" option with "VBoxManage clonehd". The user manual I have (3.0.8 ) mentions that option but does not document its purpose.

The lack of documentation of --existing was certainly the motivating factor for the post.

"External" was a poor choice of words. I suppose "3rd party separate download" would be a better description. If you don't have CloneVDI downloaded (or you're running a host other than Windows (and don't feel like fiddling with Wine)), then it's nice to have the option to do it with tools that already ship with VBox.

CloneVDI certainly a more flexible and user friendly option for Windows users. I'll update the post to mention it.

~JW

From my experience, if a user was advanced enough to be able to use the CLI to perform this they probably would not need the 3rd party tool but they might be looking for an easier way to achieve their goals. With that said I must admit that I do know how but still prefer the 3rd party tool CloneVDI to perform this as it is just faster. Start to finish can be done in under 10 minutes total which includes using Gparted to expand the partition.

Anyway it is just a matter of choice and having alternatives is always a good thing, wouldn't you say?

Perryg wrote:Anyway it is just a matter of choice and having alternatives is always a good thing, wouldn't you say?

Absolutely

Yeah, but the real bummer is that I'll now have to modify my release notes for CloneVDI, because I currently have enlarging a disk as something that VBoxManage can't do...

And btw thanks for updating your post to mention the CloneVDI alternative.