2 TB Drive Size Limit on Conversion

The current hypervisor from VMware only supports VMDK files converted from partitions of under 2 TB in size. Previous versions of Hyper-V also limited VHD files to under 2 TB as well. Any ShadowProtect image file converted using the image conversion tool to VHD or VMDK format must come from a source partition that is under 2 TB in total size. The actual size of the image file, even if it is under 2 TB in size, isn't important. If the source partition is over 2 TB then these hypervisors won't mount the file.

A workaround is to partition drives larger than 2 TB into volumes smaller than 2 TB.

Note: In Windows 8/Server 2012, Microsoft introduced a new virtual file format: VHDx. VHDx does support volumes greater than 2 TB. However, Recovery Environment and the image conversion tool do not currently support this format.

The conversion tool warns if the source partition is larger than 2 TB, depending on which version of ShadowProtect runs:

Warning in ShadowProtect versions 4.1.5 and older

When using the image conversion tool, ShadowProtect 4.1.5 and older will fail to create the converted file. Instead, it displays a -87 error in the event log:

14-Oct-2012 10:01:44 sbrest 411 Cannot create new virtual disk file E:\backups\big conversion.vmdk (-87 The parameter is incorrect.)

ShadowProtect version 4.2.x and newer

In ShadowProtect 4.2 and newer, selecting a source partition larger than 2 TB in the image conversion tool displays a dialog with the VHD and VMDK options disabled: