During “install image” on booting from a fresh image the installer will detect any old configuration and offer to copy one of the configuration which is good to “refresh” and get rid of old installed images if the system has been upgraded multiple times.
The installer will prompt you to name the image. If you give an invalid character in the name (or get a “bad” character as the first character when switching between vmware consoles) the installer will tell you that you have entered an invalid name for the image and throw you back to the prompt. At this point the new image is installed and the disk have been overwritten. If you do an “install image” again at this point your old configuration is lost.
It would have been nice to have the installer re-prompt for a new name at this point instead of just trowing me back to the prompt.