HP Z230 Can't get Win10 VM booting to installer. Ubuntu VM works fine.


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Picked up a z230 sff workstation to use as a backup server. I'd like to run a VM on it in windows 10.

 

I'm able to do so with Ubuntu:

image.thumb.png.0b7efa36977b8fe8b15299b5e8c1a26b.png

See vm log attached.

 

But I can't achieve this to save my life for Windows 10. It's the dreaded boot up loop

image.thumb.png.242116b7292f12c33319fd160b100999.png

image.thumb.png.9c5fc890fb7bb12e76f61f87e9cf147c.png

image.thumb.png.bb97e90d1185da32fc6ebc6d112d3d4c.png

I've read everything I can on here and reddit, but nothing seems to work. The attached win10 vm logs seem the same (no apparent errors?). And yes the .iso is from microsoft. and I've tried multiple .iso including ones I've successfully used on my main unraid server.

 

What's going on?

See diagnostics attached.

ubuntu_vm_logs.txt win10_vm_logs.txt unraidbackup2-diagnostics-20220617-0922.zip

Edited by bigbangus
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When you select "ovmf" as the BIOS of the virtual machine, you can quickly enter the VNC remote desktop when windows is turned on. Press any key on the keyboard to enter the system installation interface. In about three seconds, it will enter the interface you pointed out. You can force the virtual machine to be turned off and turned on again. Quickly press the Enter key or any other key on the keyboard to enter the installation interface!

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11 minutes ago, song said:

When you select "ovmf" as the BIOS of the virtual machine, you can quickly enter the VNC remote desktop when windows is turned on. Press any key on the keyboard to enter the system installation interface.

what exactly do you mean by installation interface?

 

11 minutes ago, song said:

In about three seconds, it will enter the interface you pointed out. 

again, do you mean the shell?

 

11 minutes ago, song said:

You can force the virtual machine to be turned off and turned on again. Quickly press the Enter key or any other key on the keyboard to enter the installation interface!

Do you mean turn off and on again within the unraid GUI? Can you be more specific?

Edited by bigbangus
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Are you using Q35 or i440 in the machine definition?

I had much better results with Q35.

If you start and it again goes into the shell as per your picture above, type exit on the prompt when possible. It will take you to the bios. Select boot order and then select QEMU.

then hit enter repeatedly until you go into installation

Edited by juan11perez
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40 minutes ago, juan11perez said:

Are you using Q35 or i440 in the machine definition?

I had much better results with Q35.

If you start and it again goes into the shell as per your picture above, type exit on the prompt when possible. It will take you to the bios. Select boot order and then select QEMU.

then hit enter repeatedly until you go into installation

 

So rebuilt the VM around what you said on Q35 and then typed 'exit' in the DOS style shell which entered the VM BIOS. I then selected 'Boot Manager' and clicked on 'UEFI QEMU DVD-ROM QM00001' in the picture below. The screen changes to black and says again "Press any..." and it just brings me back to the same selection in the BIOS.

 

Super frustrating because I've built so many Unraid VMs on other computers without any issue.

 

image.thumb.png.d719732e1c867ab0e377c3a07449547a.png

image.thumb.png.0fa807fc5ecd71996eb73c27e14837f3.png

 

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When using ovmf to install windows, after you start the windows virtual machine, you need to quickly enter the VNC remote desktop. When there is no screenshot of you, you need a few seconds to press any key on the keyboard, which will directly enter the windows system installation interface. If you miss this time, you will enter the screenshot of you. If you enter this interface, you need to forcibly shut down the windows virtual machine, Restart the windows virtual machine and follow the above steps. Do you understand?

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20 minutes ago, song said:

When using ovmf to install windows, after you start the windows virtual machine, you need to quickly enter the VNC remote desktop. When there is no screenshot of you, you need a few seconds to press any key on the keyboard, which will directly enter the windows system installation interface. If you miss this time, you will enter the screenshot of you. If you enter this interface, you need to forcibly shut down the windows virtual machine, Restart the windows virtual machine and follow the above steps. Do you understand?

Yeah I tried that but it still doesn't work :(

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2 hours ago, bigbangus said:

Yeah I tried that but it still doesn't work

If you are pressing a key when prompted, and I believe you are pressing it without nothing happening, I suspect the issue is that the boot is not detecting your keyboard.

How are you passing through the keyboard?Check the xml and see if you have the keyboard block type ps2 and/or the emulated usb controller with your usb keyboard passed through or the real usb controller with a keyboard attached.

If you use vnc I think you need a keyboard block defined.

Compare the 2 xml (win10 win11) and see if there's something different about the keyboard.

Edited by ghost82
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14 minutes ago, ghost82 said:

If you are pressing a key when prompted, and I believe you are pressing it without nothing happening.

When I’m pressing the key it immediately switches back to the previous screen. it’s not like I can’t press any key and it runs out of time. It’s like it refuses to boot from the media. 
 

14 minutes ago, ghost82 said:

How are you passing through the keyboard?Check the xml and see if you have the keyboard block type ps2 and/or the emulated usb controller with your usb keyboard passed through or the real usb controller with a keyboard attached.

Just manually selecting the wireless keyboard/mouse dongle to add it to the VM at the bottom.

 

14 minutes ago, ghost82 said:

Compare the 2 xml (win10 win11) and see if there's something different about the keyboard.

Good idea I’ll get back to you on that!

Edited by bigbangus
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9 hours ago, ghost82 said:

Try to download again the windows 10 iso and/or check its hash to see if it's corrupted.

 

Wow third attempt at downloading the iso worked! It was a corrupt ISO!!!! Thanks a million. Not sure what was going on that could cause this corruption. I did a memtest on the server before I started tinkering in Unraid. I've got a very old SSD in there now to just vet out things before I buy new drives. Maybe that's the issue?

 

Either way. Thanks again for suggesting the corrupt iso.

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