I have written in the past about how it is a huge time saver to copy/clone virtual machines instead of rebuilding them, however the information I supplied in that tip was with regards to Microsoft Virtual PC. The same can be done with Sun’s Virtual Box, but the process is apparently a bit more involved.

Cloning and copying VirtualBox VMs is not as straight forward or obvious as it is with VMWare Desktop and this subject has created a lot of confusion in the support forums.

[...]

This article explains how to copy an existing VM containing an installed and configured guest OS. Before starting it helps to have a basic understanding of VirtualBox virtual machines.

Granted, I have only used VirtualBox on my wife’s Mac to install Windows but have never had the need to copy the environment. After reading through the article however, the process appears to be pretty straight forward as long as you don’t have saved states on the VM.

Like what you read?

If so, please join over 28,000 people who receive our exclusive weekly newsletter and computer tips, and get FREE COPIES of 5 eBooks we created, as our gift to you for subscribing. Just enter your name and email below: