Expand Hard Disk In v7

[dan0001]

Hi,

I have workstation 7.0 and want to use the expand disk function. I have a 60Gb virtual disk that is set to NOT take all the space i.e. the file size is currently about 33Gb. I want to increase it from 60Gb to 80Gb, but I would like to understand how it will do this as I kicked it off thinking it would be a quick thing as I assumed it was more of a config thing (since the disk wasnt expanded to 60Gb already), but what it seemed to be doing was taking ages over creating a temp file in the virtual disk folder. When it got bigger than 20Gb, I cancelled the process as I was worried it would create an 80Gb file and I only have 50Gb left on that drive!

So, questions are:-

- will it create an 80Gb temp file?

- if so, why?

- will it have to expand the actual virtual disk file to 80Gb in order to complete the operation? (I quite like having it use only as much as it needs!)

Thanks in advance

Cheers

Dan

[continuum · Accepted solution]

the easiest and by far cleanest way to do this is to add another disk.

You can expand the vmdk you have now - but this will not work if you have snapshots.

It will also not expand the partition so you still have to use thirdparty tools to expand the partition - like extpart.exe or gparted LinuxLiveCD.

To answer your questions:

the disk will not be expanded to the full nominal new size of 80 Gb and the expand does nOT use a large temp-file.

The expand may add a few mbs only - but then you still need to fix the partition.

Watch out - the expand is done in place so you should know how to handle the partition-expansion before you try this.

Unfortunately we do not know which OS your guest is - so we can't tell you how to do it best

_________________________

VMX-parameters- WS FAQ -[ MOAcd|http://sanbarrow.com/moa241.html] - VMDK-Handbook

You also find me in the support crew of PHD Virtual Backup

[dan0001]

Hi Continuum,

Thanks for the reply

Sorry should have specified, guest OS is Winx64 - I believe it has something like diskpart built into Disk Management so expanding to fill unallocated space should :smileyalert: be easy (otherwise I do have Acronis Disk DIrector to fall back on).

I am pleased that it will not increase the disk file that much, but you also mention that " the expand does nOT use a large temp-file" - the progress bar was about a third to halfway in the expand operation and the temp file was already 22Gb. This is pretty big and at that rate I won't have enough space on that physical hard drive to accomodate the temp file. Is there any way to predict how large it will be without actually running the expand? It takes a long time on my laptop and it would be a bit of a bugger to get almost all the way to the end and then have it die coz of lack of disk space

Cheers

Dan

[RParker]

Is there any way to predict how large it will be without actually running the expand?

Yes the size of the original vmdk, the temp operation needs to copy this data in order to create the new file of the new size.

[dan0001]

phew, that means only 33Gb - I have space for that

Thanks guys!

Cheers

Dan