LinuxQuestions.org - Retaining saved state of a VirtualBox VM between two hosts

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Retaining saved state of a VirtualBox VM between two hosts

I run Ubuntu on my home computer and Windows XP at office.

I have a Debian VM on my ntfs USB drive and run it from both computers. It runs fine when the machine is powered off and restarted.

The problem is when I save the machine's state.

When I change to the other host, it reboots when I start the VM, without restoring the saved state.

Any workarounds, please? All help is greatly appreciated :).

When you save the state, it will create a snapshot file to:

Code:

[VirtualBox Directory]/[VM Name]/Snapshots/*.sav

Which has a time index; the latest time index should be read first.

For example I just made one, it's stored on my machine:

Code:

~/VirtualBox VMs/Arch Linux/Snapshots/2013-05-08T11-39-00-247704000Z.sav

You can either bring these with you on a USB, and put them into the snapshot folder on your host; or use a service like Dropbox to automatically sync them, using soft links:

Code:

$ ln -s <LINK> <TARGET>

or in Windows:

Code:

> mklink /d <LINK> <TARGET>

or for a directory junction

Code:

> mklink /j <LINK> <TARGET>

Where <LINK> would be in your dropbox folder, and <TARGET> would be the directory for Snapshots.
You would have to do this on both machines.

Depends on how comfortable you are in Command Line.

Hope that helps.
If it doesn't, I hope it guides you to the right path.

Is the hardware like cpu exactly the same?