Ran out of disk space now cannot access VM

[pforkes]

I am using VMware Fusion 3.1.2 on my iMac using OS X 10.6.6.

My VMware Fusion Windows XP Pro virtual machine was downloading a file, while I was away.  The disk became full and the message saying:

"The file system upon which '/users/...Windows XP Professional.vmwarevm' resides is critically low on free space...."

The two buttons on offer are "Power Off" and "Continue".

if I click on Continue the same dialog box immediately appears ago, prohibiting me from getting into the VM to do anything about it, so I cannot delete any free files to free up some disk space.

If I try to access the VM from the host it simply tells me that the connection has failed.

As far as I can tell, I am now totally screwed, unless there is a backdoor in to free up some disk space.

Any suggestions?

[ab_lal]

Can you map the $ prompt of your VM? -     //yourVM/d$

Is there a possibility to open the task manager and open explorer from there?

[a_p_]

Sounds like the disk on your MAC is out of space, rather than the one in the VM.

Try to free up some disk space on the MA so the VM continues to operate, then consider to stop the download within the VM.

André

[pforkes]

"Can you map the $ prompt of your VM? -     //yourVM/d$"

I do not understand what you mean by this.  Can you give me more details?

[pforkes]

"Sounds like the disk on your MAC is out of space, rather than the one in the VM."

My host is NOT out of disk space.  My guest DEFINITELY IS out of disk space.

[ReggieSmith]

can you power off the VM and then increase the size of the VMDK for the VM? Also, I suppose you ahave all the disk space for the VM pre-allocated (which is why it ran out of space?) 

[pforkes]

How do I resize the virtual disk?  I seem to recall that there was a 3rd party application.  I do not seem to be able to do this from VMware Fusion.

[Vmotioner]

I usually get this message when one of the mount points is full like your home folder or the one where your VMs are located.

[xingchan]

If your vm is the problem, you can extend the hdd in VMware. Then use for example hirens bootcd to the extend the partition in the vm.

[pforkes]

My host is NOT out of disk space.  My guest DEFINITELY IS out of disk space.

[pforkes]

Can you explain HOW I resize a hard disk drive in VMware Fusion? the only way that I can see how to do this is: open the virtual machine; open Virtual Machine - Settings...; click on Hard disks.  HOWEVER, everything is grayed out in the menu EVERYTHING.

[xingchan]

That is what i'm saying. If the vm running windows xp on your host (mac) is the problem follow the procedure i described.

[pforkes]

I am guessing that the reason it is grayed out is because there is snapshot of the drive (but the snapshot was taken over a year ago, that would mean that I loose everything since then (which I would prefer not to do).

[xingchan]

Sorry can't help you with that. I'm not a mac guy. In VMware Workstation and Esx you can edit the disk size. Is you vm powered off or suspended. The vm should be powered off.

[pforkes]

Can you elaborate on "the procedure you described"?  All the settings in the "Hard disk" dialog box are grayed out.

[pforkes]

The virtual machine IS powered off.

[xingchan]

Can you boot the vm in safe mode?

- Other things you can try is boot the vm with hirens boot cd. Check if there is a hiberfil.sys. If the file exists delete the file and reboot.

- lower the memory size of the vm to for example 256mb. Boot the vm with hirens boot cd and delete pagefile.sys

[Vmotioner]

Another way would be to add a second disk to that VM that is larger than what you have now and boot the VM with a boot disk and then use an imaging software like ghost to image the content to the new drive. Then attach that imaged drive to a new VM.

Vmotioner

[ReggieSmith]

just as a sidenote, running with a snapshot for an extended period of time like that is really not a good idea. snapshots should be used when you want to make a change you arent sure of as a recovery method. Once you are ok with the change you should commit the snapshot and move on.

having said that, I am not certain what your best course of action is other that to try some of the suggestions that have been made here. make sure the VM is off, reduce the amount of RAM to 256MB (this will reduce the overhead needed by the VM), boot the VM with a 3rd party utility as was suggested and delete the hibernation file)

But your biggest area of concern is that snapshot. You need to commit it so that you can access the disk settings. Problem is that you dont have space in the VMDK and I suspect that the snapshot file is rather large as well.

Can you open terminal on your Mac and type df -h at the command prompt? paste the results into this thread

[WoodyZ]

Peter A Forkes wrote: "The file system upon which '/users/...Windows XP Professional.vmwarevm' resides is critically low on free space...."

VMware Fusion does not put up a message like this when the virtual hard drive is full and whether or not you want to believe this if VMware Fusion puts up an message like this it is because the Macintosh HD is running low on space however there have been some cases where VMware Fusion is overzealous in its reporting in that the disk may not have literally been full but that amount of free space VMware Fusion wants to have isn't present.

To help figure out what is what the best way to provide comprehensive diagnostic information is to use the "Collect Support Information" command from the VMware Fusion (menu bar) > Help > Collect Support Information and then attach the vm-*.tgz file it created on your Desktop.