As for virtual disks of the VMware Workstation format, a virtual disk is represented as a single diskname.vmdk file (monolithic sparse) which is an extent data file that contains an embedded virtual disk descriptor. The pattern of a virtual disk descriptor name is diskname.vmdk and the pattern of a virtual disk extent name that contains all raw data is diskname-flat.vmdk, accordingly. However, virtual machines residing on ESXi servers use a slightly different format of vmdk virtual disks – a virtual disk descriptor and virtual disk extent that contains raw data of the virtual disk are two separate files on the ESXi datastore. vmdk extension of files and is used by VMware and VirtualBox virtual machines.

VMDK is a virtual machine disk file format, which is the open format developed by VMware.

How to mount VMDK files by using /dev/loop.

Other methods to open VMDK files in Linux.

How to open VMDK files with 7-zip on Windows.

How to open VMDK files with 7-zip on Linux.

Using 7-zip to extract content from VMDK files.

Example 2: How to mount VMDK on a Windows host.

Example 1: Mounting VMDK on a Linux host.

Mounting VMDK files in a host OS with VMware Workstation.

Methods that don’t need powering on a VM.

Example 2: Mounting a virtual disk to a VM running on VMware Player or VMware Workstation.

Example 1: Mounting a virtual disk to a VM running on ESXi.

How to mount a VMDK file as a virtual disk to a healthy VM on VMware ESXi, Workstation or Player.

Using Live DVD even if an OS on a VM is dead (a legacy method).

The following sections of the blog post about how to open VMDK files are included in this article: If a VMDK file is encrypted or corrupted, another technique must be applied. Today’s blog post covers the methods that can be used if a VMDK virtual disk is not encrypted or corrupted. There are a number of methods that allow you to access the content of VMDK virtual disk files. This situation can happen after the unsuccessful installation of some applications, updates for an operating system, malware attacks, accidental file deletion, etc. Sometimes a VM cannot be started, however you may need to access the data stored on a virtual disk used by a VM. By Michael Bose How to Extract Content from VMDK Files: A Step-By-Step Guide

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