When do you need this service?
- A datastore that the host no longer mounts
- A VMDK or VHDX file that is corrupt or was deleted
- A snapshot chain that broke and left the machine unbootable
- A virtualised server on a RAID array that failed underneath it
Technical process
- Technical evaluation of the underlying storage and of the virtualisation layer. This stage has a cost.
- A technical report and a quotation covering the lab hours and specialists the case requires
- Recovery of the physical or array-level storage first, when the fault is underneath the hypervisor
- A low-level clone before any work on the virtual disk files
- Rebuilding of the disk descriptors and of the snapshot chain
- Extraction of the data from inside the virtual disk, or delivery of a bootable machine
Frequently asked questions
The host is fine but the VM will not boot. Is that recoverable?
Often yes. When the hardware is healthy the problem is usually inside the virtual disk or in the snapshot chain, and both can be rebuilt.
Can you recover data from inside the virtual machine, not just the disk file?
Yes. We extract the file system from inside the virtual disk, which is what matters when the machine itself will not start.
Which virtualisation platforms do you work with?
All of them. We work at a low level, on the data in hexadecimal: to us the platform only changes the virtual disk format and the file system. We handle VMware (ESXi, vSphere, VMFS and vSAN), Microsoft Hyper-V, Proxmox VE, KVM and QEMU, XCP-ng and Citrix Hypervisor (XenServer), Nutanix AHV, Oracle VM and VirtualBox, with VMDK, VHD/VHDX, qcow2, raw and VDI disks, and LVM, ZFS or Ceph volumes.
What does the initial evaluation cost?
The technical evaluation has a cost, because it involves specialist diagnostic time. The report and quotation that follow it cover the lab hours and personnel your case requires.
Is your virtualised server down?
Write to us and we will get back to you straight away, 24/7/365.
We answer in English by email and WhatsApp. Phone calls are answered in Spanish.
Related services
Is this for you or for your organisation? For businesses and institutions we work with a signed confidentiality agreement, formal invoicing and priority 24/7 support.