Filename extension | |
---|---|
Developed by | VMware |
Latest release | 5.0 (December 20, 2011) |
Type of format | Disk image file |
Website | code.vmware.com/web/sdk/6.7/vddk |
VMDK (short for Virtual Machine Disk) is a file format that describes containers for virtual hard disk drives to be used in virtual machines like VMware Workstation or VirtualBox.
Initially developed by VMware for its virtual appliance products, VMDK 5.0 is now an open format[1] and is one of the disk formats used inside the Open Virtualization Format for virtual appliances.
VMDK file is the virtual disk image file created by VMWare software. It stores all contents of a virtual disk. A Vmware virtual hard disk can be made up one or multiple VMDK files. To open VMDK file, please follow the steps, Run PowerISO. Click the 'Open' button on toolbar or choose 'File Open' menu to open vmdk. Oct 12, 2019 VMDK to HDD better than unix qemo-img and dd and stuffing around with 2nd Linux virtual machine. Remember to uninstall the VMware drivers before you take an image of a windows machine. There were some posts about installing drivers and sysprep for windows but it's only available on windows server, so good luck to you all. The VMDK file extension refers to 'Virtual Machine Disk'. It’s an open file format provided by VMware, mostly used for services for cloud computing and virtualization. Basically, vmdk files are virtual disk files containing all the info of a virtual machine. Dec 09, 2019 RAC shared vmdk’s can be thin provisioned to start with and can slowly consume space as and when needed. The Build numbers and versions of VMware vSAN can be found at KB 2150753. Key points to take away from this blog. Prior VMware vSAN 6.7 P01 (ESXi 6.7 Patch Release ESXi601), Oracle RAC on vSAN requires.
The maximum VMDK size is generally 2TB for most applications, but in September 2013, VMware vSphere 5.5 introduced 62TB VMDK capacity.[2]
Support[edit]
All VMware virtualization products support VMDK; this includes VMware Workstation, VMware Workstation Player, VMware Server, VMware Fusion, VMware ESX, VMware ESXi, and all software-plus-service offerings that incorporate them.
Third-party software that support VMDK include:
- Parallels Desktop for Mac version 10[3]
- VirtualBox[4]
- former SUSE Studio
- former Sun xVM[5] (ancestor of VirtualBox)
- Norton Ghost
- Paragon Hard Disk Manager[citation needed]
- DiskInternals VMFS Recovery[citation needed]
Format[edit]
![Multiple VMDK Files are their |VMware Communities Multiple VMDK Files are their |VMware Communities](/uploads/1/2/9/3/129315105/574239145.png)
The VMDK format includes multiple differing subformats, some of which store metadata in an external descriptor file, while others embed it with the main data in a single file.[6] A flat image allocates space ahead of time while a sparse images grows as the virtual machine writes to it. Flat images can use the underlying file system's sparse file capability, as is done with the vmfs format on ESXi. An image can also refer to a parent image and only store changes made in a copy-on-write fashion. This enables creating a snapshot of a virtual machine's state.
![Vmdk size Vmdk size](/uploads/1/2/9/3/129315105/929104992.png)
Extents[edit]
The descriptor specifies a series of one or more extents that typically refer to a file or device that holds the actual data, unless for example they are of type
ZERO
, which emulates a zero-filled extent.[7] Each extent can be marked either RW
, RDONLY
, or NOACCESS
to signify that the virtual machine should have respectively read/write, read-only, or no access to that part of the disk. The number and types of extents in an image depend on its createType
. An image with createType='custom'
can contain an arbitrary combination of extents.Virtual disk provisioning options[edit]
Flat disk images can be provisioned in one of three ways:
- thin: Blocks are not allocated or zeroed during initial provisioning. Instead, the image is created as a sparse file. Block allocation and zeroing is performed at first access.
- zeroedthick: Blocks are allocated during initial provisioning but are not zeroed until first access.
- eagerzeroedthick: Blocks are allocated and zeroed during initial provisioning.
What Files Make Up A Virtual Machine? - VMware
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^'Virtual Disk Format 5.0'(PDF). VMware. December 20, 2011.
- ^'vSphere 5.5 Storage Enhancements Part 1: 62TB VMDK'. CormacHogan.com. 24 September 2013. Retrieved 11 September 2017.
- ^'Parallels Announces Parallels Desktop 10 for Mac'. www.parallels.com.
- ^'Chapter 5. Virtual storage'. www.virtualbox.org.
- ^'Oracle and Sun Microsystems - Strategic Acquisitions - Oracle'(PDF). www.sun.com.
- ^'VMDK-Handbook-Basics'. sanbarrow.com.
- ^'libvmdk/VMware Virtual Disk (VMDK) format specification'. github.com.
External links[edit]
Vmdk S001
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