I was using everything fine this morning, like always, for years.
Docker Desktop suggested I update, which I’ve done several times. I upgraded from 4.27.1 to 4.43.2, now everything is gone. The update took like 30 seconds and didn’t say anything was wrong, just that I need to restart docker desktop to complete my upgrade, little did I know it was the last time I would see my work. When it restarted it posted an error:
running engine: waiting for the Docker API: engine linux/wsl failed to run: starting WSL engine: bootstrapping wsl: "[2025-07-22T20:13:09.065031558Z][wsl-bootstrap][F] preparing environment: provisioning data: preparing block device /dev/sdf: detecting file system: unsupported fs on /dev/sdf:
I’ve been able to piece together the following, after 8 hours of toiling through this nightmare:
Before the upgrade, my work was at “C:\ProgramData\DockerDesktop\vm-data\DockerDesktop.vhdx”
After the upgrade, my work is at “C:\Users%user%\AppData\Local\Docker\wsl\disk\docker_data.vhdx”
When I try to mount my old vhdx, it says it’s corrupted. The folder structure is different, but it says its not ext4, which isn’t true.
What is worse, even in my old work, the vhdx file has nothing in the container folder anymore, this leads me and all AI’s (Tried Gordon, the Docker Desktop AI, as well as ChatGPT, Claude, Kimi K2) that I am screwed and there is no recovery for this.
How is this possible? What am I missing? How could a small version bump literally change the base location for all your data and slay the containers folder of your prior data? This seems absolutely insane. Was there some kind of forced update in format or something?
Also, the AIs are saying Docker Desktop is “notorious”, “noted for” and “constantly” blows away containers during upgrades… is this true? I’ve never had this problem before.
Anyone have any insight? Am I actually screwed for upgrading? Is Docker Desktop actually known for this?