Data Lost on machine upgrade Vertex AI User Managed Instance

[sarora1]

Today I was working on a notebook of a machine which was a User Managed Instance. As it was taking time running my codes in jupyter notebook, I decided to upgrade the hardware. Now I can't seem to find any of my notebooks. Where is all my data? This is very urgent I'm feeling lost, can someone please help?

[lsolatorio]

Hi @sarora1, 

Thank you for joining our community

I know this might be concerning, especially since data loss is a possibility during upgrades. Upgrading involves creating a new instance with the desired configuration, and data migration can be risky.

Here's a couple of potential recovery options:

• Usually data backups are required before upgrades. If you made a copy of your user data before the upgrade, that could be your saving grace.
• If your notebook were stored on a persistent disk attached to the old instance, there's a chance that it is still there, you could try attaching the old disk to the new instance and see if you can access them.

While it might seem like reverting the upgrade is the answer, it usually doesn't restore user data. Rollbacks typically use backups focused on system configuration, not user files. 

Vertex AI Support has a team of experts who can assist you with this data recovery process. While data recovery isn't guaranteed, they can guide you through the available options and explore every avenue to potentially retrieve your notebooks.

I hope I was able to provide you with useful insights.