Recover Deleted VMDK File

[Hojjat]

Hi everyone,

I've deleted "Web Service_53.2" virtual machine because I didn't need it. After that, the "Veeam" virtual machine didn't power on and this error appeared :

"An error was received from the ESX host while powering on VM Veeam.

Cannot open the disk '/vmfs/volumes/52b67704-f65320be-b19a-2c768a523aa4/Web Service_53.2/Web Service-000003.vmdk' or one of the snapshot disks it depends on.

The system cannot find the file specified

VMware ESX cannot find the virtual disk "/vmfs/volumes/52b67704-f65320be-b19a-2c768a523aa4/Web Service_53.2/Web Service-000002.vmdk". Verify the path is valid and try again."

I don't know why VMDK file of "Veeam" is related to "Web Service_53.2"?

Why these VMDK files have relation with each other? (Delete one VM, Another VM don't power on)

How can I resolve this problem?

How can I recover this VMDK file?

Please step by step guide.

Regards,

[lvaibhavt]

Hi Hojjat,

Couple of questions First >> What is VM web service all about. I mean what was there on the server

Second >> Right click the Veeam VM > edit settings > select HDD and check the for the paths of the HDD. Check whicn ones are pointing to web service vm?

There is no easy way of recovering VM's. VMware will not support recovering VM's. I googled and found there are third party tools that can do it for you. How reliable they are I am not sure as I have not used them. Once of them is Recover Data from VMFS, ESX, ESXi, vSphere Disks try it in the lab and then in prod.

[Hojjat]

Thanks for replying,

"Web Service" virtual machine is a server for programmers and they can publish their web applications on it. This server is no longer available.

Here is a screenshot of Veeam HDD settings:

I didn't add these hard disks.I don't know what are these? some of these hard disks are related to another VMs, It's strange !!!

I only added one hard disk for VM "Veeam" at once.

What should I do?

Any recommendation will be appreciated.

[cjscol]

I suspect that the Veeam VM is using "Hot Add" to add the VMDK(s) from the VMs you are backing up to the Veeam VM so that it can directly access them to back them up.  Once the backup of each VM is complete then it should remove the VMDK(s) from the Veeam VM.  For some reason this VMDK has been left attached to the Veeam VM, perhaps it was backing it up when you deleted it or something went wrong the last time it was backing it up and it never managed to remove the VMDK from the Veeam VM.

I would suggest editing the settings of the Veeam VM and removing the Web Services VMDK from it.  Hopefully it should then power on and boot up and function correctly.

[cjscol · Accepted solution]

Looks like you have many vHDs from many VMs attached to your Veeam VM.  I would suggest removing them, make sure that you do NOT select the option to delete from disk when you remove them.

[Hojjat]

Thanks for replying Calvin,

I've removed them and Veeam VM is now correct and power on. Now I would try to resolve other issues to prevent occuring these types of problems.

Best Regards,

[cjscol]

Next time you run a Veeam backup check the VM to see if it has attached VMDKs from your VMs to it and then check it again afterwards to see if they have been removed.