1.29 Saving Virtual Machines

The save operation preserves the exact state of the virtual machine’s memory. The operation is somewhat similar to hibernating a computer. The virtual machine is off, but it can be quickly restored to its previously-saved running condition. The operation does not make a copy of any portion of the virtual machine’s virtual disk.

When saved, the virtual machine is paused, its current memory state saved to a location you specify, and then the virtual machine is stopped. The amount of time to save the virtual machine depends on the amount of memory allocated. When saved, a virtual machine’s memory is returned to the pool of memory available on the host.

The restore operation is used to return a saved virtual machine to its original running state.

IMPORTANT:After using the save operation, do not boot, start, or run a virtual machine that you intend to restore. If the virtual machine is at any time restarted before it is restored, the saved memory-state file becomes invalid and should not be used to restore.

Save a Virtual Machine’s Current State (Virtual Machine Manager)

  1. Run Virtual Machine Manager.

  2. Make sure the virtual machine to be saved is running.

  3. Select the virtual machine.

  4. Click Open to view the virtual machine console or Details to view virtual machine information.

  5. Select Virtual Machine > Save from the menu.

  6. Name and save the file.

Save a Virtual Machine’s Current State (xm Command)

  1. Make sure the virtual machine to be saved is running.

  2. In the host environment, enter xm save ID state-file where ID is the virtual machine ID you want to save and state-file is the name you specify for the memory-state file.