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Verifying ESX virtual machine file names
Symptoms
You want to rename a virtual machine
Unable to power on a virtual machine
Powering on a virtual machine fails
Cannot power on virtual machine
Error when attempting to power on a virtual machine: A file was not found
Purpose
This article provides steps to verify the files names that are associated with a virtual machine. If there are any discrepancies between what a virtual machine expects to find and what is present, the virtual machine fails to power on.
Resolution
A manual name change of any file associated with a virtual machine may render the virtual machine unable to start.
Note: Avoid spaces, brackets, or non UTF-8 characters when naming virtual machines and their associated files.
To check the files that are associated with a virtual machine you can use the configuration file (.vmx file) of the virtual machine.
To find the configuration file location of your virtual machine you can use the vmware-cmd command. For more information on the vmware-cmd command, see the VMware Scripting API .
Press Enter. This returns the paths to the configuration files of every virtual machine registered on that ESX Server host. For example, '/vmfs/volumes/storage1/vm1/vm1.vmx' .
After you can find the configuration file, check each file associated with your virtual machine.
You see entires similar to:
NVRAM File
nvram = "vm1.nvram"
VMXF File
extendedConfigFile = "vm1.vmxf"
Hard Disk (.vmdk file)
scsi0:0.fileName = "vm1-000001.vmdk"
Hard Disk (.vmdk file) not located in same directory
The file names listed in the configuration file are what the virtual machine expects and needs to find to power on.
If you are seeing File not found errors when trying to power on your virtual machine, the log files in your virtual machine directory indicate which file is causing the issue. For example, Mar 27 17:13:38.680: vmx| DISKLIB-LINK : "/vmfs/volumes/46b2f3ea-980a1c90-6724-001122334455/vm1/vm1DriveD.vmdk" : failed to open (The system can not find the file specified) .
If you discover a problem with the files name of your virtual machine, the following article may help in troubleshooting:
This article outlines the correct procedure to follow when renaming a virtual machine and it's associated files. The article also outlines methods of overcoming problems when these files become corrupted.
