How can I make a V2P transition from a VMware disk image to a disk partition?

Question

I have a Windows 10 virtual machine under VMware Workstation Player on Linux. The disk is stored under VMware’s default file format.

How can I copy / adapt / write the file system contents from the virtual disk to a (native) hard disk partition? I have (among other resources) live Linux Mint Sylvia media, and I intend to place Linux on another partition, and should be able to copy the disk image / stored virtual machine.

Thanks,

—UPDATE—

The disk image is not one-to-one as far as bytes go; the default VMware disk format (which I used) is split into relatively small files of up to 2G, but they are often significantly smaller than 2G for unused space in the guest disk image.

I imagine @vautee’s comment assumes a concern that I don’t want to be using a Cygwin dd to copy drives to a mounted disk from a Windows guest itself.

How, in terms of specific commands, can I achieve what a dd would achieve from a single, straight, uncompressed ISO-like disk image, if what I have now is a series of VMware’s 2G chunks that are often less than 2G where the drive space isn’t (fully) used?

Answer 1

I'd use some linux live system, for example kali linux, to boot and then convert/dd from the virtual disk image to your physical partitions. Afterwards, don't forget to chroot into your new partitions and re-install grub - and even adapt your /etc/fstab to the new system.

To merge all your max 2GB .vmdk files into one single, have a look at vmware-vdiskmanager. Unfortunately, this needs the same amount of diskspace while in transit, again.