virtualbox.org

Hello all,


Like in the topic, I had a fine working VM with openSUSE, but at some point my host system crashed.
What was left were the files in the VirtualBox VMs folder.
I installed Virtual Box and added the old VM with openSUSE to it.
When I start it, it seems to boot but hangs on a black screen displaying:
GRUB _

I'm kind of new to the VMs business so I am not sure what to do at this point to bring the old VM back...
(log attached)


Thanks in advance.

Enable hardware virtualization in the hosts BIOS and see if that helps.

Perryg wrote:

Code: Select all

00:00:00.773726 HMR3Init: Falling back to raw-mode: VT-x is disabled in the BIOS.

Enable hardware virtualization in the hosts BIOS and see if that helps.

nope, didn't help,
but thanks

Lets try step by step maybe.
Should it be possible to import a VM, which was not 'properly cloned', to a new installation just like that ?

It depends on what you mean when you say import. These days all you need to do is to move the old folder to the new location and use the add feature. See the following:
How to move guests created with => version 4.*

Perryg wrote:It depends on what you mean when you say import. These days all you need to do is to move the old folder to the new location and use the add feature. See the following:

Ok, so in theory it should work (I have done exactly what is written in the tutorial).
So now, what might cause it to freeze right after displaying GRUB _...

One thing I noticed (or did), when I added the VM, there was an error that its pointing to an .iso that doesn't exist (it was the openSUSE DVD).
So I downloaded the .iso, deleted the old reference and added the new one.
(the DVD was not actually used since it was booting form the hard drive)
Maybe this has something to do with it...

What you could try is seeing if the .vdi will boot. What you would need to do is create a new openSUSE VM with the same settings as the original but don't create a hard disk. Once you do that, remove the non-working version from VirtualBox but select Keep Files. Then in the new machine, click on storage and navigate to the folder with the old version and attach the .vdi to the new machine. If it won't boot, the .vdi would seem to be damaged.

loukingjr wrote:What you could try is seeing if the .vdi will boot. What you would need to do is create a new openSUSE VM with the same settings as the original but don't create a hard disk. Once you do that, remove the non-working version from VirtualBox but select Keep Files. Then in the new machine, click on storage and navigate to the folder with the old version and attach the .vdi to the new machine. If it won't boot, the .vdi would seem to be damaged.

Ok, will try.
I'm off for the weekend so I will let you know on Monday if it worked.

Thanks!

You're welcome. I actually don't think it will boot since the guest is getting as far as Grub. So most likely the openSUSE .vdi is corrupted and you would have to look to the openSUSE folks to see how to correct Grub etc. Or you would have to create a new openSUSE guest, attach the old .vdi as a slave drive and copy any files you may need from it.

This is why backups are a good idea.

openSUSE uses UUID for the HDD if memory serves me. You may need to boot into recovery mode and make sure that the drive information is still valid.

Hi again,

I'm back to the fight.
So I created a new VM, installed Suse from scratch and attached the old drive to the system.
When I try to access it I get:

An error occurred while accessing 'Home', the system responded: The requested operation has failed: Error mounting /dev/sdb2 at /run/media/dawid/40bb5bab-528a-4735-867b-3c6ae808d5cc: Command-line `mount -t "ext4" -o "uhelper=udisks2,nodev,nosuid" "/dev/sdb2" "/run/media/dawid/40bb5bab-528a-4735-867b-3c6ae808d5cc"' exited with non-zero exit status 32: mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sdb2, missing codepage or helper program, or other error In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try dmesg | tail or so.

So i tried fdisk:
Disk /dev/sda: 43.9 GB, 43946278912 bytes, 85832576 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk label type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x000c6a30

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 2048 4208639 2103296 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2 * 4208640 37189631 16490496 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 37189632 85831679 24321024 83 Linux

Disk /dev/sdb: 102.1 GB, 102129991680 bytes, 199472640 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk label type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x000326a2

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 2048 4208639 2103296 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdb2 * 4208640 46153727 20972544 83 Linux
/dev/sdb3 46153728 199471103 76658688 83 Linux


The partition with over 102 GB is the one that I can't get running and i need to access
blkid:
/dev/sda1: UUID="d3d91872-6f04-4803-9158-6ebc3c0d5e16" TYPE="swap"
/dev/sda2: UUID="b4fcc1f2-90cb-4985-a72b-c787050ac646" TYPE="ext4" PTTYPE="dos"
/dev/sda3: UUID="0ba99dcb-b108-4645-a444-76f743453e19" TYPE="ext4"
/dev/sdb1: UUID="d463b584-a921-402c-b150-9271b3c09a17" TYPE="swap"
/dev/sdb2: UUID="40bb5bab-528a-4735-867b-3c6ae808d5cc" TYPE="ext4" PTTYPE="dos"

now, I noticed that the UUID is diffrent from the one in the .vbox file, which is:
<HardDisk uuid="{4d2d5bc0-52e1-4598-bba8-43f88a0e5b9d}" location="OpenSUSE.vdi" format="VDI" type="Normal"/>


I am not sure from which side to bite it... should I modify the .vbox file and try again to run it or maybe to play with it in Suse and try to get it running from there.

thanks for helping.

Icki wrote:Hi again,

I'm back to the fight.
So I created a new VM, installed Suse from scratch and attached the old drive to the system.

I take it you didn't first try what I suggested?

loukingjr wrote:

Icki wrote:Hi again,

I'm back to the fight.
So I created a new VM, installed Suse from scratch and attached the old drive to the system.

I take it you didn't first try what I suggested?

amm... not sure what you mean...
I did attach it as a slave drive, but I can't access it in Suse.
I have a new drive on which I installed Suse and the old one attached.
unless I misunderstood something...

I mean this...

What you would need to do is create a new openSUSE VM with the same settings as the original but don't create a hard disk. Once you do that, remove the non-working version from VirtualBox but select Keep Files. Then in the new machine, click on storage and navigate to the folder with the old version and attach the .vdi to the new machine. If it won't boot, the .vdi would seem to be damaged.

It seems you did create a hard disk otherwise you couldn't have installed openSUSE in the new guest. I just thought it might be worth trying in case the .vbox file was damaged.

I think we are beyond my knowledge but hopefully someone else can help.

loukingjr wrote:I mean this...

What you would need to do is create a new openSUSE VM with the same settings as the original but don't create a hard disk. Once you do that, remove the non-working version from VirtualBox but select Keep Files. Then in the new machine, click on storage and navigate to the folder with the old version and attach the .vdi to the new machine. If it won't boot, the .vdi would seem to be damaged.

It seems you did create a hard disk otherwise you couldn't have installed openSUSE in the new guest. I just thought it might be worth trying in case the .vbox file was damaged.

I think we are beyond my knowledge but hopefully someone else can help.

O! sorry,
yes, I tried that, results in the same thing - hangs on GRUB_
But thank you for trying.