Virtualizing Dead Windows XP Machines in Unraid - How ?


Shinobi

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Hi,

I was wondering if there is any Unraid specific procedure or guide that can be used to breathe fresh life into those old Windows XP machines, virtually.

In my case, the motherboards are dead & won't boot.

 

So far, this is what I have been reading....

 

It seems that, migrating Physical windows to Virtual Windows, involves some registry patching, which is supposed to be usually done when the machine was in working condition

For Virtual Box:

Quote

https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Migrate_Windows

For reasons we don't understand, Windows memorizes which IDE/ATA controller it was installed on and fails to boot in case the controller changes. This is very annoying because you will run into this problem with basically all migrated images. The solution here is to perform several modifications to the Windows registry. This can be done while the installation is still running on the original system because all it does is relax the IDE checks. Therefore the installation will continue to work on the original system after the modification. The easiest way is to use the excellent MergeIDE utility from the German c't computer magazine. Alternatively, instructions in Microsoft's knowledge base article can be followed: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314082

 

A technet article on 7b during P2V:

Quote

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/michs/2011/09/16/p2v-migration-issues-with-hyper-v-stop-0x0000007b/

When converting a Windows XP / Windows 2003 machine with P2V utilities, a STOP: 0x0000007B may occur during boot in Hyper-V. (Pressing F8 during boot and selecting the option to "Disable automatic restart on system failure" will reveal the blue screen error code.) 

 

Some more instructions ..

Quote

https://edoceo.com/howto/kvm-windows-p2v

Migrating Windows Physical to Virtual on Linux KVM

For most Windows systems, since Windows 2000 the migration from physical to virtual is a snap. Simply import the mergeide registry hack and power off, use dd and other tools to dump the full-disk and you're done.

 

Merge IDE for KVM: (This looks like something that can be applied offline)

Quote

https://github.com/jakobadam/kvm-mergeide

kvm-mergeide - Apply the mergeide.reg hack to kvm compatible windows images.

The mergeide fix relaxes the annoying windows requirements for same hardware. This avoids 0x0000007B errors after you move system disks to other hardware, e.g., from physical to virtual hardware.

This script applies the fix automatically.

 

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5 hours ago, Shinobi said:

I was wondering if there is any Unraid specific procedure or guide that can be used to breathe fresh life into those old Windows XP machines, virtually.

Not that I'm aware of. You have listed all the info needed, the only thing missing that I can see is that you need to specify a live CD image that you can boot from to apply the registry edit.

 

Pretty much the procedure would be...

1. Either image the XP drive and use the file or directly specify it as the main VM hard drive using /dev/disk/by-id/

2. Specify your live cd that contains the tools to mount the XP registry as the boot / install drive

3. Start the VM, make sure it boots to the live utility cd, mount the XP drive and alter the registry.

4. Reboot the VM and start normally.

 

The VM controller you specify in the unraid VM setup will initially need to be recognized by the utility iso, then possibly changed to match the controller type that the registry change allows.

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Hey I just did this and would be happy to help if you have not figured it out yet.

 

Edit : I did it with just an old hard drive laying around that had xp on it that was last booted in 2003. No machine to boot it on. No way to "prepare the os" on a current system. 

Edited by letrain
Further clarification
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  • 1 year later...
On 9/30/2018 at 11:50 PM, letrain said:

Hey I just did this and would be happy to help if you have not figured it out yet.

 

Edit : I did it with just an old hard drive laying around that had xp on it that was last booted in 2003. No machine to boot it on. No way to "prepare the os" on a current system. 

Hey I know this thread is super old but could you clarify in detail? I really need to know how exactly this is done, step by step if possible. I have a very important xp machine with a very old database that im trying to preserve as a vm until our new database is completed. I cloned the hard drive with clonezilla and restored it to a blank vdisk1.img that i created but when i boot the vm I run into the blue screen message and reboot issue mentioned above. I only had one shot at making the image because the machine is still in production so i need to figure out how to make the reg edit offline on my vdisk1.img.

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