vmdk size mismatch

[andrez]

Hi,

I have a question about the size of the vmdk file. I set up a 40GB dynamic disc and installed Vista Sp2 x64 Home Premium. The used space inside Windows is 22.9GB. But the vmdk is 29.9 (look at the attached picture).

I compacted the vmdk inside the Player options, but the size didn't reduce. Why is the vmdk 7GB larger?

best regards

System:

Windows7 Ultimate Sp1 x64 - German

AMD Phenom II X4 945 3GHz - 4 Cores

8GB DDR3 1333 RAM

Radeon HD 5770 1 GB

1TB Samsumg F3

VMWare Player 3.1.4 build-385536

[WoodyZ · Accepted solution]

The free space on the Guest's Filesystem first needs to be zeroed out and this is normally done using the shrink function, which both zeros out the free space and compacts from within VMware Tools within the Guest OS when supported otherwise an alternate method of zeroing out the free space would need to be done before using the Compact command.

[andrez]

ah, thanks. I must use the compact function from the VMTools inside the Guest. Now the vmdk is 23GB.