Trying to Convert a Windows XP disk to VirtualBox

[Stephen]

I missed the Win7 part they don't have said repair install.

in fact if you ever lose the mbr on win7 your  (so far i have found)
boned without a backup.

On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 12:31 PM, Mark Phillips
<mark at phillipsmarketing.biz> wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 12:16 PM, Stephen <cryptworks at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> im not fully familiar with P2V for virtualbox, however the only time i
>> did a P2V using the VMware converter it required a 3rd machine to do
>> the work. and image directly to the server.
>>
>> however what you can do, and maybe a good idea anyhow is use something
>> like clonezilla to make an image of that partition and then restore it
>> into the virtual machine and run a repair install?
>
>
> What is a repair install? I don't have the Windows disks because it cam
> pre-installed on the machine. Any web pages that talk about this process?
>
> Mark
>>
>> On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 11:49 AM, Mark Phillips
>> <mark at phillipsmarketing.biz> wrote:
>> > I have a dual boot machine with two physical drives - Windows XP Pro and
>> > Debian testing. I need to replace the Windows drive with another drive
>> > to
>> > add more space to the Debian drive. Instead of just chucking the Windows
>> > drive drive (only 40GB and the machine only has space for two hard
>> > drives),
>> > I thought I would virtualize it and run it in virtualbox on the Debian
>> > machine. I am having no success in (1) finding a lot of information on
>> > how
>> > to do this and (2) actually accomplishing the task.
>> >
>> > I have tried using vmware vcenter converter 4.0.1. I have the client
>> > running
>> > on one Linux machine (hammerhead), the Windows source on another
>> > (basenji),
>> > and the destination folder is a windows share on a third machine
>> > (goofy).
>> > After struggling to get it to run, it dies within a minute with an
>> > error:
>> >
>> > FAILED: Unable to create a VSS snapshot of the source volume(s). Error
>> > code:
>> > 2147754758 (0x80042306).
>> >
>> > It is able to find the client and source folder with no issues. Googling
>> > the
>> > error code and message did not give me any good results. I had one
>> > warning
>> > on the config setup screen - "Unable to locate the required Sysprep
>> > files.
>> > Please upload them under
>> > /var/vmware-vcenter-converter-standalone/sysprep/xp
>> > on the Converter server machine." I found the .cab on the Microsoft site
>> > and
>> > put it in the required location, but I still get that warning.
>> >
>> > My questions -
>> >
>> > 1. Anyone know how to get VMware converter to work? My assumption, after
>> > some reading, is that virtualbox will be able to import the output from
>> > vmware converter.
>> >
>> > 2. Other suggestions for recipes to virtualize a physical Windows XP
>> > drive?
>> >
>> > Thanks!
>> >
>> > Mark
>> >
>> > P.S. The other reason I want to make this work, is that I have a new
>> > laptop
>> > with Windows 7. I planto install Debian and virtualize the Windows 7
>> > partition and get rid of the dual boot. This excercise with the Windows
>> > XP
>> > drive is my test bed to see how to make it work. I am not sure if there
>> > are
>> > any extra gotchas to virtualizing Windows 7.
>> >
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>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from
>> rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button.
>>
>> Stephen
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>
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-- 
A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from
rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button.

Stephen