Comments on: Resize a Virtual Disk with VMware Converter

By: Odds and Ends | The Sales Engineer

Odds and Ends | The Sales Engineer — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 04:50:30 +0000

[...] what you have. No longer to you have to go through this old methodical process. Now you can use VMware Converter to do it for you through the UI. Very slick! (why this isn’t standard in Workstation I [...]

By: Chipping the web: November 22nd -- Chip’s Quips

Chipping the web: November 22nd -- Chip’s Quips — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 13:03:25 +0000

[...] 4sysops – Resize a Virtual Disk with VMware ConverterExcellent! You can download the VMWare Converter utility here.Tags: vmware resize sysadmin converter cloning virtualization [...]

By: Piotr Findeisen

Piotr Findeisen — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 15:50:29 +0000

simplier:
vmware-vdiskmanager -x 10GB myDisk.vmdk
( http://www.clydesdalesoftware.net/blogs/jluif/PermaLink,guid,e8e85c34-5fd1-4ce4-b6b7-4cea58121ae8.aspx )

By: David Faure

David Faure — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 11:39:59 +0000

Then again, I just used VMWare Converter 3.0.3 (with source other and destination other, to convert from a VMWare image to a VMWare image), and the NTFS partition seems to have resized automatically. I see the new size in Explorer immediately after booting the new image. So ntfsresize doesn’t seem to be needed after all.

By: David Faure

David Faure — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 10:26:47 +0000

Paul (comment #12): you need to use ntfsresize to enlarge the filesystem, as explained in http://weblogs.asp.net/kdente/archive/2006/01/07/434789.aspx, I think.

By: VMware Converter 3.0 - Easy Way to Create virtual machines on your computer

VMware Converter 3.0 - Easy Way to Create virtual machines on your computer — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 17:37:48 +0000

[...] information on Resize a Virtual Disk with VMware Converter Via [...]

By: Paul Coddington

Paul Coddington — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 01:43:25 +0000

Of course, doing it the old-fashioned way works just fine, even better in fact:

1. Add an extra disk to the VM.
2. Boot the VM with an Acronis TrueImage CD in the CD-ROM.
3. Format the new disk using TrueImage.
4. Backup system to extra disk.
5. Shutdown VM.
6. Delete and recreate system disk in larger/smaller size, preallocated or dynamic, as desired.
7. Disconnect and reconnect all virtual hard disks in required order (to ensure IDE assignments are correct).
8. Boot from CD.
9. Format the new blank system disk using TrueImage.
10. Reboot from CD to reassign drive letters.
11. Restore image from backup to C: drive.
12. Shutdown VM.
13. Delete backup disk.

Viola: system boots, disk space is increased, no need to repair VMware Tools, gets around VMware 6 not recognising Vista as importable, etc.

By: Paul Coddington

Paul Coddington — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 23:57:01 +0000

Hmm… seeing an interesting problem with this tool.

I tried increasing a machine from 25GB to 50GB, and the result is:

1. VMware reports 50GB.
2. Guest ‘Windows Disk Manager’ reports 50GB.
3. Guest ‘Windows Explorer’ reports 25GB.
4. Guest ‘chkdsk’ reports 25GB.

By: Gabriel

Gabriel — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 15:29:04 +0000

The solution I used was to clone the latest snapshot (making a ‘full clone’) and then using that as a starting point to resize.

By: theUtmost

theUtmost — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 05:45:07 +0000

@Gabriel – which process are you referring to?
The VM Converter procedure as outlined by Michael?
Can’t answer that sorry – never tried it.

As for using the VM Import wizard (as outlined in my comment #24 on the other post):
“…if you have multiple snapshots, you can keep whatever state you would like for the new VM, although the new VM will not be able to USE any of the snapshots in the old machine. However, you still have the original VM machine unaltered as a backup”
Hope that helps
tU

By: Gabriel

Gabriel — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 22:52:34 +0000

Does this work when snapshots are used?

By: theUtmost

theUtmost — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 22:24:14 +0000

Sorry in advance for posting this again, I’m just trying to be helpful…

Essentially there is ALSO a way to do this using a standard vmware workstation v6 without any extra functions, addons or tools, or using any commandline tools. You do it all from the plain vanilla vmware GUI. I cannot vouch for earlier versions – you may need to use the vmware Converter tool.

See my comment #24 on this post:
http://4sysops.com/archives/expanding-a-virtual-vmware-disk/

By: Kelly

Kelly — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 09:57:44 +0000

Thanks
this really helped

By: jokerc

jokerc — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 02:00:33 +0000

Thanks.

By: VMware Converter 3.0 - Easy Way to Create virtual machines on your computer at AdGlobe Tech Blog

Sun, 13 May 2007 11:37:03 +0000

[...] information on Resize a Virtual Disk with VMware Converter Via LiveHacker Share This post to :These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can [...]

By: Verdens mest ligegyldige blog » Resizing af diskstørrelse i VMWare

Verdens mest ligegyldige blog » Resizing af diskstørrelse i VMWare — Thu, 10 May 2007 10:22:37 +0000

[...] en kort tur på Google faldt jeg over denne artikel, der omtaler at det er muligt at bruge VMWare Converter til at resize den virtuelle disk, som en [...]

By: Brian

Brian — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 13:35:23 +0000

Did the clone, and resize, then boot to Windows Server 2003 in my Vista Premium Laptop and it still shows 4GB on the VM system. The settings confirm 6GB. I’ll try to do a few more tweaks to see if I can get it going.

By: VMware Converter 3.0 - Easy Way to Create virtual machines on your computer at TechMixer

Mon, 12 Feb 2007 04:52:12 +0000

[...] More information on Resize a Virtual Disk with VMware Converter Via LiveHacker Share and Enjoy:These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]

By: VMTN Blog

VMTN Blog — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 14:11:43 +0000

Using VMware Converter…

Craig Pringle walks us through some steps of using VMware Converter, now in beta, wih very nice screen shots. Craig Pringle – Converting a Physical Machine to a Virtual Machine. After that I installed VMWare Converter onto a Windows 2003…