"File not found: (blah blah blah).vmdk" Error Powering On VM But File No Longer Specified in .VMX

[mbmast]

On Workstation 11 I am getting the following error message attempting to start a copied VM:

File not found: C:\Share\Copy of the XP VM C drive\Windows XP Professional Template 50GB-000005-cl1-000014-cl1.vmdk

This file is required to power on this virtual machine. If this file was moved, specify the new location

The .VMX file did specify the following:

scsi0:1.present = "TRUE"

scsi0:1.fileName = "C:\Share\Copy of the XP VM C drive\Windows XP Professional Template 50GB-000005-cl1-000014-cl1.vmdk"

scsi0:1.mode = "independent-persistent"

But these lines have been removed.  I've attached the edited VMX file that causes Workstation to generate the error.

If this VMDK file is no longer specified in the VMX file, where is Workstation getting the name of the file when it produces the error message?  Why is it producing this error message?

Steps I've taken to try to resolve this:

1.  Close and re-open Workstation.

2.  Reboot the host machine (Windows Server 2012 Essentials R2)

[mbmast · Accepted solution]

I'm answering my own question here.  The problem turned out to be in the VM's .VMSD file.  That file apparently contains a "roadmap" of the snapshots and there were entries there for the drive I removed from the .VMX file.  After removing references to those snapshots inside the .VMSD file, I still encountered a configuration error because the number of snapshots was still set to "2".  This is not the number of snapshots that you would normally think of when making a snapshot; rather, this is the number of virtual drives for which snapshots exist.  After making the following change:

snapshot.numSnapshots = "1"

the virtual machine started right up with no issues.

[vmman34]

Good answer.

You just got me out of a hole as I was looking in all the wrong places.

I removed the reference to the missing disk from the .vmsd file and the VM started as normal.

Thanks

[danny2001s]

Suddenly I had same issue.

File "Windows 7 x64-000002.vmdk" not found at Virtual machine folder. Instead, just "Windows 7 x64-000001.vmdk" was there.

VMX file have this setting:

      scsi0:0.fileName = "Windows 7 x64-000002.vmdk"

so I tested changed that configuration to the existing file:

      scsi0:0.fileName = "Windows 7 x64-000001.vmdk"

And Virtual machine started.