When we install a virtual machine in VirtualBox, a vbox file is automatically created on our hard drive. The aforementioned file will be located in the virtual machine installation and contains its configuration. We can install a virtual machine with the same information on another computer using the aforementioned file. However, some users report that when adding the virtual machine using the vbox file they encounter the message “VirtualBox cannot register the DVD image”. Today we are going to see how to solve this annoying problem.
Generally, the error that appears on the screen is the following:
Cannot register DVD image ‘ISO File Location’ {ABCD } because a CD/DVD image ‘ISO File Location’ with UUID {EFGH } already exists.
VirtualBox cannot register the DVD image
If we see this error message stating that VirtualBox cannot register the DVD image when we add a virtual machine through the vbox file, we are going to have to use one of the following solutions to try to resolve it.
- Change the UUID in the vbox.
- Delete the entry under the DVDImages tag.
Next, we are going to see both solutions in detail, explaining how to apply them without problems. But before proceeding further, we recommend that we backup the virtual machine installation folder to another external hard drive or USB flash drive.
To be able to edit the vbox file, specialized software is not needed, we can do it with Notepad++ which we can download from this link and we highly recommend it due to its sheer number of options and keeping the basic simplicity of Windows Notepad.
Change the UUID in the vbox file
If we see the details of the error message, we can see that it mentions UUID. So, to start fixing this problem, we’re going to have to replace the existing UUID with a different one. For this, we are going to copy the entire error message and paste it into a text editor.
- We start by closing VirtualBox if we have it open.
- We go to the location where we have saved the vbox file.
- We right click on this file and we will open it with any text editor that we have available.
- Once we open the file, we will see the message that says “Do not edit this file”, we are going to ignore it. We will look for DVD images. For this we can use Ctrl + F (find function).
- Next, we will open the text editor in which we have pasted the error message earlier. This message will have two different UUIDs. One of these UUIDs has to match the UUID under the DVDImages tag. So let’s replace this UUID with the other one shown in the error message.
- To finish, we are going to proceed to save and close the text editor.
To finish, we are going to have to open VirtualBox and add the virtual machine using the vbox file that we have edited. You should no longer have to keep getting the error message.
Delete the entry under the DVDImages tag
Another way to fix it is to remove the entry under the DVDimages tag. The first thing we will do is close VirtualBox and open the vbox file in a text editor.
We will look for the DVDImages tag and then remove all the entries below it. The DVDImages tag starts with
In this example we will be able to appreciate what we should delete, let’s pretend that we have this label in the vbox file:
After deleting the content of the tag, it should look like this:
To finish, we are going to have to save the file and close the text editor that we were using. We proceed to add the virtual machine and now yes, we should not have to continue dealing with this annoying error.
