vmware delta and vmsn restore

[s1nichi]

dear all, recently i delete all the snapshot but i cancel it at 50%, and when the vm start it crash, and i fsck the linux data but it make the data loss and cannot recover. but the -delta file is still there but snapshot manager can see it. i had the backup vmsn file also. what should i do to make things back to snapshot, based on -delta file and vmsn file.

regard,

 

[scott28tt]

I’ve reported your thread so a moderator can move it to one of the vSphere areas.

[a_p_]

Not sure what can be done, but if you provide details, I will take a look at this.

What I need is:

1.  what exactly did you do after canceling the snapshot deletion, i.e. did you modify any files, etc.?
2. how much free disk space do you have on the datastore
3. run ls -lisa > filelist.txt from the command line to get a list of files in the VM's folder
4. download the VM's *.vmdk descriptor files (only the small ones without flat, or delta in their names), the .vmx file, and the filelist.txt. Then compress/zip these files, and attach the .zip archive to your next reply.

André

[s1nichi]

after canceling the deletion i tried to boot up the vm, but it failed it said the vmdk disk was not there. after some edit it can boot up but without the delta file. and it went fsck after that i lost the data.

the free disk now only 6-20Megs

[a_p_]

>>> ... after some edit ...
That's what may be important! What exactly did you edit?

Anyway, from the files that you've presented, I tried my best to understand the current situation.

Some questions:

• "the free disk now only 6-20Megs" -> are you sure it's Megs and not at least Gigs?
• The file listing contains "appserver.badaksinga-dc831483.vswp". Didn't you shutdown the VM as soon as you detected the incorrect/old state? The longer it ran, the higher the chance of file system corruption.
• Did you rename "appserver.badaksinga_1.vmdk" to "appserver.badaksinga2.vmdk"? Why?

I cant tell you whether the following steps will resolve the issue, but they are at least worth a try:

1. Shut down the VM unless already done
2. If "appserver.badaksinga-dc831483.vswp" still exists after the VM has been powered off, delete this file to free up disk space
3. Delete the files "appserver.badaksinga-Snapshot1.vmsn", and "appserver.badaksinga.vmsd"
4. extract the attached .zip archive, and upload the two .vmdk descriptor files to the VM's folder on the datastore
5. edit the VM's .vmx file, and replace
   scsi0:1.fileName = "appserver.badaksinga2.vmdk"
   with
   scsi0:1.fileName = "appserver.badaksinga_1-000001.vmdk"
6. Reload the VM by following steps 2 and 3 from https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1026043
7. Assuming that you have sufficient available RAM (~32GB), edit the VM's settings, and enable "Reserve all guest memory" in its memory settings. This will result in a zero byte .vswp file once the VM is powered on, to save disk space. Later, once everything is back online (hopefully), and snapshots have been deleted, disable this setting again.
8. Create a new, temporary snapshot!!! This will ensure that the current .vmdk files won't get modified.
9. Power on the VM

If the VM comes up, check everything, but don't let it run for a long time, so that it will not fill up the datastore again. If everything looks ok, shutdown the VM, and click "Delete All" from the Snapshot Manager to delete/consolidate the Snapshots.

If something is not clear, please ask before you power on the VM!

André