VMware Data Recovery

Is VMware data really hard to recover?

Severe data loss can occur on various systems installed by VMware virtual applications with the .vmdk extension. But unfortunately, VMware does not provide built-in undelete functionality, which makes VMware data recovery very difficult for users.

But is it really so? Actually, there are other options that can help you recover lost files from VMware virtual machines without worry. You can try data recovery software that offers VMware data recovery, or contact a data recovery company immediately depending on the importance of your data. Here we prefer to choose the former.

Why do we prefer VMware data recovery software?

Compared to data recovery companies, VMware data recovery application software is more cost-effective. We recommend you to use DiskGenius as your first choice, it can search for lost and deleted files, including Office documents, videos, audios, backups and compressed files, and then rescue every lost files with special recovery algorithms. The VMware data recovery can be done by DiskGenius without launching the virtual machine, below are the steps on how VMware data recovery works.

Step 1: Run DiskGenius and load the VMDK virtual disk file of the VMware.

1. After running DiskGenius, choose from the main menu: Disk > Open Virtual Disk File, as shown in the following figure:

2. Select the virtual disk or disk image you want to open and load it. Then you can view the disk in DiskGenius.

Step 2: Restore data from the virtual disk.

The operation is the same as restoring data from a physical hard disk.

1. After DiskGenius loads the virtual disk file, it can perform various operations on the virtual disk, including data recovery, as shown in the following figure:

2. After clicking Start, DiskGenius will start searching for data:

3. After the scan is complete, open the listed files for preview:

4. Copy files that need to be restored:

Recovering Data from VMware Disks FAQ

1. What is a VMDK file?

Actually, VMDK files are virtual disk image files. They are created by VMWare software or VirtualBox and will create one or more VMDK files to store all the information related to a specific virtual disk on the device.

2. Where can I find the VMDK files?

If you are using an ESX/ESXi host, you can find the VMDK file by looking at /vmfs/volumes or one of the shared storage. You can also find storage volumes from the vSphere Client, named datastore1 and datastore2.

3. What is a virtual machine snapshot?

A snapshot is actually a copy of a VMDK file (the virtual machine's disk file) at a point in time. A snapshot is a log of changes to a virtual disk on a machine. Whenever your virtual machine is damaged due to system errors or other reasons, you can use snapshots to recover.

4. How do I revert to a snapshot in VMware?

• Go to the VMware Host Client inventory.
• Select the virtual machine.
• Right-click the virtual machine.
• Select Snapshot.
• Select Restore Snapshot from the submenu.
• Click Restore and wait. (Please save the current machine state in a snapshot, just in case.)

Bottom Line

This article describes how to use DiskGenius to recover data on a virtual hard disk in a virtual machine. Using the method of directly loading the virtual hard disk file, the data recovery operation of the virtual hard disk can be conveniently and quickly completed without starting the virtual machine. In fact, for virtual hard disks, DiskGenius also provides a lot of other operations, such as formatting partitions, resizing partitions, backup and restoration, etc. Basically, what DiskGenius can do to a hard disk, it can do the same to a virtual hard disk. Download DiskGenius now if you need it to learn about its rich features!

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