Looking for some different method to be able to copy an entire partition and convert it to a VDI virtual disk, I found the following command:

VDI is a native format of VirtualBox, could it present some differences in the format when creating the VDI virtual disk in this way compared to creating it in VirtualBox?

Have you tried how this works? Copy sector by sector or only sectors in use?

There will be no guarantee that a third party program will create a .vdi but it is easy enough to try. I've used it before and generally works. There used to be a few web sites that could create any sort of virtual hard drive file you wanted too.

This is all different than copying. If you have a current .vdi then just copy it. It is a file. There is no real need that I know of to go in and use dd or other tool in this case. If you wish to change format then you might try taking a copy of the file and qemu convert it.

To clone sector by sector it is best that the specifications of the disk be exact. I suppose one could fool with the two formats to try to make a clone of it in different format.

There are better clone operations than sector by sector I'd think for most OS's.

Thanks for answering!

I have not yet tested the execution of this command because I want to make the best decision.

I do not have the VDI file yet. It's exactly what I'm looking for, from the partition or disk, to create a VDI file; I need both modes, sector by sector and only sectors in use.

In the case of sector by sector, I need this to be able to do some tests of information retrieval and forensic investigation (that's why you should not change the content of any sector when going to VDI).

In the VirtualBox forum I have been advised to use a backup tool instead of the VBoxManage command. The problem with this is that I will need twice the total size of the disk since I have to make a copy and then a restoration inside VirtualBox.

With the command published here, if it works correctly, you do not need two copies and therefore less time lost.

I do not know if this is a good option. In the qemu documentation I found this about the files created by qemu (VDI): VirtualBox 1.1 compatible image format.

I see you have many choices to make.