Repeatable resume makes it easy to start a virtual machine again and again in the exact same state. This is useful, for example, in a QA testing or classroom environment.
When you suspend a virtual machine, a file with a .vmss extension is created. This file contains the entire state of the virtual machine. When the virtual machine is resumed, its state is restored from the .vmss file. This means that, in normal operation, the .vmss file cannot be used to resume a virtual machine again from the original suspended state.
However, repeatable resume lets you resume a virtual machine in the same state repeatedly. Every time you resume the virtual machine, it starts from the same point at which it was suspended using the same .vmss file.
Repeatable resume only works with virtual disks in nonpersistent mode.
Once you set a repeatable resume point for the virtual machine, you cannot suspend it; you can only power it off. After you power it off, you resume the virtual machine to start it up again. The virtual machine starts at the point at which it was suspended.
If you need to reset a virtual machine that is set up to use repeatable resume, you should restart the guest operating system (using Start > Shut Down > Restart for Windows guests, shutdown -r now for Linux guests). Do not click the Reset button on the virtual machine’s toolbar. Otherwise, any files you created or other changes made to the guest operating system are lost.
Restarting or resetting the guest operating system does not affect the suspended state. To return to your repeatable resume point, just power off the virtual machine, then resume it.
To enable repeatable resume in your virtual machine, complete the following steps.
After you suspend then resume the virtual machine, the .vmss file is not removed. When you power off the resumed virtual machine, you can again resume its operation in the same state using the same .vmss file.
After you suspend then resume the virtual machine, the .vmss file is not removed. When you power off the resumed virtual machine, you can again resume its operation in the same state using the same .vmss file.
Repeatable resume makes it easy to start a virtual machine again and again in the exact same state. However you cannot suspend this virtual machine; you can only power it off. After you power it off, you can resume the virtual machine to start it up again. The virtual machine starts at the point at which it was suspended.
You can reset a virtual machine that is set up to use repeatable resume. This restarts the guest operating system but does not affect the suspended state. You cannot suspend the virtual machine again, however. To return to your repeatable resume point, just power off the virtual machine, then resume it.
If you no longer want to resume the virtual machine from this repeatable resume point, do the following:
With the virtual machine powered off, you can enable the feature again so that the next time you power on, you can set the virtual machine into a different state and save that as a new repeatable resume point.
By default, the redo-log file for a disk in nonpersistent mode is located in your system’s temp directory. VMware suggests that you place the redo log for a virtual machine using repeatable resume in a different location (outlined in the steps above), as some temp directories may be small in size (and the redo log could exceed this limit as it grows) or, on Linux hosts, the temp directory may get cleared by the operating system on a regular basis, and this would remove the redo log.
VMware does not recommend moving a suspended virtual machine containing disks in nonpersistent mode to another host. However, if you want to take advantage of the repeatable resume feature in a classroom environment, for example, and do not want to set the same repeatable resume point individually on every student’s machine, be very careful and keep the following warnings in mind:
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