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An attempt to initialize VM saved state failed

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Monday, October 12, 2009 3:17 PM

Hi,

Just put clean install of windows server R2 on machine. Installed the Hyper-V role. When I go to create a new virtual machine using the default locations the process works fine. When I change the default location to a different folder  (i.e. on drive D: instead of drive c:) then although the virtual machine is created, when I START the VM to install the OS I get the message 'An attempt to initialize VM saved state failed'. It appears to be failing to create a saved state. I thought this might be a permissions problem but as far as I can see the permissions are identical on the default folder and the new folder on d:. I have tried recreating a different folder on D: but each time I get the same message.

I have read posts about incompatible snapshots and removing saved state before upgrading to R2 but I am not upgrading. I just want to create a new VM on a different drive.

Would be grateful if anyone has any ideas.

Thanks

All replies (16)

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 6:57 AM ✅Answered | 2 votes

Hi,

 

According to the event log, seems it’s a permission issue. I have a post discussed the similar issue with yours, you can refer to:

 

After upgrading to Windows 2008 R2 can't start VM's

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/windowsserver2008r2virtualization/thread/b26fe762-62eb-48ec-b538-ddeed61e1fae

 

 

Best Regards,

Vincent Hu

 

Monday, October 12, 2009 7:37 PM

Hi Akeso

You built the VM, and then changed the default location?

  • What did you change specifically? Snapshot location? VM location? Both?
  • When you created the VM, did you shut it off, or save it, before you changed the Hyper-V configuration?
    This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 10:14 AM

Hi,

 

Please perform the following suggestion:

 

1.    Try to create a VM on the default location(under C: drive),

2.    Shutdown the VM, export it to D: drive,

3.    Import the VM in Hyper-V Manager

4.    Start the imported VM to test whether you get the same issue.

5.    If you get the same issue, please take a screen shot of the error, upload it some website and then paste the link here.

 

By the way, please check whether you can find any errors in Event Viewer.

 

In addition, you can run psr.exe in Run to open the Problem Steps Recorder. Start Problem Steps Recorder and repeat the steps to create one VM on D: drive, send us the result.

 

 

Best Regards,

Vincent Hu

 

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 10:25 AM

Hi Sean,

Initially I had no VMs.
I created a new VM using the default locations found in Hyper-V settings:

Virtual Hard Disks: C:\Users\Public\Documents\Hyper-V\Virtual hard disks
Virtual Machines: C:\Users\Public\Documents\Hyper-V\Virtual hard disks

The VM was created and when I started the VM it began installing the OS from an ISO image (Windows 7)

At this point everything is fine. I now decide that I would prefer to store my virtual machines in the D: drive because there is much more space. I therefore try to create a new VM using the wizard as before but instead of leaving the default locations for the Virtual machine and virtual hard drive I specify a new location D:\Hyper-V for each. The wizard creates the folder on d: and sets permissions and creates the VM. I now start the VM in order to install the OS but almost immediately I get the error message 'An attempt ti initialize VM saved state failed'.

I have followed this procedure several times before with the Hyper-V ion Windows Server 2008 without any problems. This has only happened since I have installed Windows server 2008 R2.

I should also point out that this is a clean install of Windows Server 2008 R2 NOT an upgrade.

I should also point out that I have tried the procedure above specifying c:\Hyper-V as the location for the Virtual machine and virtual hard drive and it works fine without any errors. The problem only occurs when I specify drive d:. I have done a disk check which reported no problems and there is 350Gb of space on the drive.

The event log shows the following:

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker
Date:          12/10/2009 17:53:39
Event ID:      3080
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          NETWORK SERVICE
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine 5' could not create or access saved state file D:\Hyper-V\New Virtual Machine 5\Virtual Machines\C89A1295-CC8B-44F2-8953-C94E308AC180\C89A1295-CC8B-44F2-8953-C94E308AC180.vsv. (Virtual machine ID C89A1295-CC8B-44F2-8953-C94E308AC180)

THanks

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 11:25 AM

Hi Vincent,

Thanks for your suggestions which I will try out. Meanwhile here are the errors from the event log:

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker
Date:          13/10/2009 11:26:40
Event ID:      3080
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          NETWORK SERVICE
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine' could not create or access saved state file D:\Hyper-V\New Virtual Machine\Virtual Machines\EAB727D1-368F-4DAF-BCA1-B74C3D0966F1\EAB727D1-368F-4DAF-BCA1-B74C3D0966F1.vsv. (Virtual machine ID EAB727D1-368F-4DAF-BCA1-B74C3D0966F1)

followed by

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker
Date:          13/10/2009 11:26:40
Event ID:      3040
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          NETWORK SERVICE
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine' could not initialize. (Virtual machine ID EAB727D1-368F-4DAF-BCA1-B74C3D0966F1)

Regards

Stephen

Tuesday, October 13, 2009 1:43 PM

Hi Vincent,

I performed the following steps:

  1. Built new VM using default locations (c:\ drive) and installed Windows 7 and integration services then turned off the VM.
  2. I exported the VM to a folder on drive d: (d:\Exported Virtual Machines)
  3. I copied the VM from d:\Exported Virtual Machines to d:\Hyper-V (which is the location created when I created a VM on drive d: originally)
  4. I imported the VM from d:\Hyper-V
  5. There were errors on import but I don't think they are relevant - Here they are though:

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS
Date:          13/10/2009 14:00:52
Event ID:      18430
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          SYSTEM
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
Import task failed to fix up connection information for connection 'C:\Windows\system32\vmguest.iso'.

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS
Date:          13/10/2009 14:00:52
Event ID:      12634
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          SYSTEM
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine 2': The file name '' is invalid. You cannot use the following names (LPTn, COMn, PRN, AUX, NUL, CON) because they are reserved by Windows. (Virtual machine ID 444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD)

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS
Date:          13/10/2009 14:00:52
Event ID:      14140
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          SYSTEM
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine 2' failed to add device 'Microsoft Virtual CD/DVD Disk'. (Virtual machine ID 444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD)

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-VMMS
Date:          13/10/2009 14:00:52
Event ID:      18130
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          SYSTEM
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
Failed to import correctly the device '{ResourceType=21, OtherResourceType="<null>", ResourceSubType="Microsoft Virtual CD/DVD Disk"}' for 'New Virtual Machine 2' (Virtual machine ID 444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD). Error: Invalid parameter (0x80041008) .

  1. I tried to start the VM but got the same error message as before:

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker
Date:          13/10/2009 14:02:24
Event ID:      3080
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          NETWORK SERVICE
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine 2' could not create or access saved state file D:\Hyper-V\New Virtual Machine 2\Virtual Machines\444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD\444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD.vsv. (Virtual machine ID 444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD)

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker-Admin
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Hyper-V-Worker
Date:          13/10/2009 14:02:24
Event ID:      3040
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:     
User:          NETWORK SERVICE
Computer:      CTCSERVER08.ctc.ac.uk
Description:
'New Virtual Machine 2' could not initialize. (Virtual machine ID 444B5F3E-C8CB-41A8-8596-5D72BF133FCD)

I then ran the Problem Step Recorder while creating a new VM (called Test1) in d:\Hyper-V and trying to start it.

You can view a screenshot and get the PSR results from my SkyDrive at

http://cid-c5a38c465443fb59.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/Shared?authkey=NrxR42hjXi8%24

Thanks

Stephen

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 8:18 AM | 5 votes

Hi Vincent,

I gave authenticated users list permissions with scope this folder only to the root of drive D: and everything works. Strange that drive d: needs these permissions but not drive c:.

Thanks for your help.

Regards

Stephen

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 8:46 AM

Hi,

 

Glad to hear that you have resolved the issue.

 

 

Best Regards,

Vincent Hu

 

Tuesday, December 1, 2009 4:53 PM | 1 vote

Great fix Stephen, thanks for posting your resolution.  I was having the same issue and this has resolved it. Big Thumbs up here.

John

Friday, April 30, 2010 1:51 PM | 1 vote

I gave authenticated users list permissions with scope this folder only to the root of drive D: and everything works. Strange that drive d: needs these permissions but not drive c:.

I had exactly the same problem and I gave this permission to the root of D: and works! THANKS!!!

Monday, November 8, 2010 9:53 AM

After spending 2 weeks on this problem, I finally gotten a solution here. Thanks for the help

Monday, November 8, 2010 9:53 AM

After spending 2 weeks on this problem, I finally gotten a solution here. Thanks for the help

Monday, September 2, 2013 10:49 AM

I can also confirm Stephen's fix worked.

Thanks.

Saturday, November 21, 2015 5:05 PM

Probably not a great idea to open up such permissions.

If you go in the GUI and choose a different snapshot location, then browse back to the original that fixes the correct permissions on that directory.

PowerShell also works.

get-vm | foreach {

    $path = $_.path
    write-verbose $path -Verbose

    Set-VM -VM $_ -SnapshotFileLocation $env:TEMP
    Set-VM -VM $_ -SnapshotFileLocation $path

    Start-VM -VM $_

}

Wednesday, December 7, 2016 6:39 AM

Same resolution for brand new VM at Server 2012 Standard.

Thanks  for your note Stephen!

Wednesday, October 4, 2017 2:51 AM

Hola 

A mi me funciono tambien dandole todos los derechos en la raiz del disco a los usuarios autenticados

La maquina virtual funciono sin problemas

Saludos y muchas gracias

Rene Rangel