Howto: Windows XP in both VM and native - DISCUSSION

[MarkCranness]

If you were very careful to not ever dualboot the real XP, and to also not modify the XP partition in the host, while you had a snapshot in the VM twin, and you made sure to 'Delete Snapshot' all snapshots before running the dualboot XP, then I think you could use snapshots. But that sounds too fragile and disaster prone.

[vkov_tinsky]

The regsetdword utility is no longer available on http://www.hotlinkfiles.com/files/19276 ... ord.tar.gz
Does anyone have an alternative download location? I can't find it with google...

Ooops, only noticed that just now.

It's now attached to the What about Vista section (which really should just have been part of the activation section). Direct link here.

Regards,
VT

[biker3]

Hi!
I'm trying to run Windows XP OEM native and Windows wants activation, but VirtualBox doesn't accept a parameter.

I want to try with Ethernet MAC and WiFI MAC with the next script for configure system information:

Code: Select all

#! /bin/bash
VM_NAME="WXPreal" # Name of your Virtual Machine 
VSETED="VBoxManage setextradata $VM_NAME"
CFG_PATH="VBoxInternal/Devices/pcbios/0/Config"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSVendor       "TOSHIBA"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSVersion      "Version 3.60"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseDate  "04/26/2007"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseMajor  3
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseMinor  60
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSFirmwareMajor 1
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSFirmwareMinor 10
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemVendor     "TOSHIBA"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemProduct    "SATELLITE PRO U200"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemVersion    "PLUA1E-011001SP"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemSerial     "X6626634G"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemUuid       "100AC880-E820-18F1-8011-B10186626634"
$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemFamily     "0000000000"

But the problem is SystemFamily, because when I start the virtual machine I obtain this error:

Fallo al iniciar la máquina virtual WXPreal.
Configuration error: Querying "DmiSystemFamily" as a string failed (VERR_CFGM_NOT_STRING).
Unknown error creating VM (VERR_CFGM_NOT_STRING).

And detaills:

Código Resultado:
NS_ERROR_FAILURE (0x80004005)
Componente:
Console
Interfaz:
IConsole {6375231a-c17c-464b-92cb-ae9e128d71c3}

dmidecode results for:

• dmidecode -t0

  # dmidecode 2.9
  SMBIOS 2.4 present.
  
  Handle 0x0000, DMI type 0, 24 bytes
  BIOS Information
  Vendor: TOSHIBA
  Version: Version 3.60
  Release Date: 04/26/2007
  Address: 0xE0000
  Runtime Size: 128 kB
  ROM Size: 1024 kB
  Characteristics:
  [...]
  BIOS Revision: 3.60
  Firmware Revision: 1.10

• dmidecode -t1

  # dmidecode 2.9
  SMBIOS 2.4 present.
  
  Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 27 bytes
  System Information
  Manufacturer: TOSHIBA
  Product Name: SATELLITE PRO U200
  Version: PLUA1E-011001SP
  Serial Number: X6626634G
  UUID: 100AC880-E820-18F1-8011-B10186626634
  Wake-up Type: Other
  SKU Number: 0000000000
  Family: 0000000000

In case I have tried with:

Code: Select all

$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemFamily     ""

and

Code: Select all

$VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemFamily     "X86-based PC"

but Windows continues wants to be reactivate. I attach a screenshot from msinfo32 also because I see some parameters that don't match

Regards

[Devport]

Just confirm please, snapshots cannot be used in this kind of environment, right?
tnx!

I use snapshots and they work fine. Changes are merged into the raw partition as they should. But you should make a backup copy of your windows partition and be very cautious since it probably will corrupt your windows partition if you use a snapshot and change the raw content by booting it natively at the same time because the snapshot wont know about any changes done to the original raw partition. Only do it if you got a backup and if you know how snapshots work...

I suppose using snapshots, booting windows natively and then merging back the snapshot will corrupt the partition !

[Etepetete]

@biker3
This might relieve your activation problem; the error message can be avoided when using the parameter "<EMPTY>" for your DMISystemFamily data. (See here.) Hopefully you have a copy of your VM. I believe, once you have booted the VM, resetting the DMI info doesn't help anymore.

[biker3]

@biker3
This might relieve your activation problem; the error message can be avoided when using the parameter "<EMPTY>" for your DMISystemFamily data. (See here.) Hopefully you have a copy of your VM. I believe, once you have booted the VM, resetting the DMI info doesn't help anymore.

Thanks for your reply. I will try, because I have tried wih VMWare also without success
I am beginning to think it can be a component problem that does not detect the same name

[MarkCranness]

I'm trying to run Windows XP OEM native and Windows wants activation...

Is this Windows XP pre-installed by the OEM, or is it installed from OEM media?
Those two situations handle activation differently. OEM Pre-installed "SLP" cannot be spoofed by VirtualBox DMI data.

See this post: http://forum.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.p ... 47#p111547

[tgall]

I have been unsuccessful in having Vista change the CurrentConfig. I've tried the script that also changes the PreferenceOrder, but that also seems to have no effect. Has anyone had any luck with this?

Tim

dloar wrote:
- Hardware profiles for Vista: The regsetdword utility does not work for me, I created two hardware profiles as you explained, and saw regsetdword changing the ControlSet001\\Control\\IDConfigDB\\CurrentConfig registery-key from 1 (VM) to 2 (native), but after Vista starts natively (and exits) it is always returned to 1.

[ahznb]

I've found a way to fix this, if anyone is interested.

I have an XP raw that boots both natively with halmacpi.dll and also from VB with halacpi.dll. I have a script that does what TerryE suggests, which is to copy the appropriate hal and ntoskrnl files, modify the XP registry to boot the appropriate hardware profile, sudo run VB from a different user that belongs to the disk group, and then clean up after VB closes.

Booting both ways works but every time I switch from native to vb and vice-versa, XP discovers new ACPI hardware and tells me to reboot. The way I fix this is to install one computer class instance of "ACPI Multiprocessor PC" in HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\ACPI_HAL\0000 and then another instance of "Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) PC" in HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\ACPI_HAL\0001, have both instances of the ACPI drivers installed in HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Control\Class\{4D36E966-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\0000 and 0001, and then have the computer class instances point to their respective ACPI driver instances. Then I tell each hardware profile to disable the other ACPI_HAL, so that the appropriate ACPI_HAL driver is loaded in each profile while not loading the incorrect ACPI_HAL. I added CSConfiFlags=1 to HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Hardware Profiles\0001\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum\ROOT\ACPI_HAL\0001 to disable the multiprocessor hal in the vb profile, then added CSConfiFlags=6 to HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Hardware Profiles\0002\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum\ROOT\ACPI_HAL\0000 to stop the single processor hal in the native profile.

This requires a lot of tweaking and rebooting, since you most definitely won't succeed in one try, so this is not for the faint of heart. You also require a program that can edit registry hives in linux since you can't edit HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\ACPI_HAL\ in XP. I used Petter Nordahl-Hagen's reged tool which you can get from http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/.

If any one has anything to add or suggest a better way, please tell me, I could have lived in a cave until now and this thing has been solved a long time ago for all I know.

Hi Terry - Any scripts you would be willing to share? I am still running into the same problem. I started from scratch, XP SP3. When ever I switch between versions it has to reload the ACPI drivers.

After running VB restart the native instance, message found ACPI computer followed by, found new hardware multiproc ACPI. After a reboot back to the same instance all is well.

Boot back into VB, message found multiproc ACPI, followed by found new hardware ACPI. Again, after a reboot back to the same instance all is well.

Boot options look like this:

Code: Select all

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP (Native)" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect /kernel=ntkrnlmp.exe /hal=halmacpi.dll
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP (VM)" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect /kernel=ntkrnlsp.exe /hal=halsp.dll 

In halsp.dll, the original file name property is halacpi.dll which I believe is correct. Its like is has some old references to the acpi drivers that are not just setting the correct hal at boot?

I tried the script approach but still have the same problem, started from the script list for setting the hardware profile.

Code: Select all

#! /bin/bash

VISTA_VM=NativeXP
VISTA_PARTITION=/dev/sda1
VISTA_MOUNT=/mnt/rawXP
HIVE_PATH=/WINDOWS/system32/config
HWPROFILEKEY=ControlSet001\\Control\\IDConfigDB\\CurrentConfig
HWPROFILEVM=2     # VM hardware profile number
HWPROFILENATIVE=1


 # Native hardware profile number

setHwProfile() {
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT
  sudo mount -t ntfs-3g -o rw $VISTA_PARTITION $VISTA_MOUNT
  #/usr/bin/regsetdword -f $VISTA_MOUNT/$HIVE_PATH/system $HWPROFILEKEY $1
  sleep 1
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT



  sudo mount -t ntfs-3g -o ro $VISTA_PARTITION $VISTA_MOUNT
}

setVMKernel() {
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT
  sudo mount -t ntfs-3g -o rw $VISTA_PARTITION $VISTA_MOUNT
  
  rm $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/hal.dll 
  rm $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntoskrnl.exe 

  cp $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/halsp.dll $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/hal.dll
  cp $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntkrnlsp.exe $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntoskrnl.exe
	
  sleep 1
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT

}

setNativeKernel() {
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT
  sudo mount -t ntfs-3g -o rw $VISTA_PARTITION $VISTA_MOUNT

  rm $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/hal.dll 
  rm $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntoskrnl.exe 

  cp $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/halmacpi.dll $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/hal.dll
  cp $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntkrnlmp.exe $VISTA_MOUNT/WINDOWS/system32/ntoskrnl.exe
  sleep 1
  sudo umount $VISTA_MOUNT

}

#setHwProfile $HWPROFILEVM
setVMKernel
/usr/bin/VirtualBox -startvm $VISTA_VM
setNativeKernel
#setHwProfile $HWPROFILENATIVE

Any suggestions as to what I am doing wrong?

Thanks!

[jolival]

Hi

For windows user´s

Save this code in a batch file

change waht you need

Code: Select all

set VM_NAME=winxp
set VSETED=VBoxManage setextradata %VM_NAME%
set CFG_PATH=VBoxInternal/Devices/pcbios/0/Config
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSVendor       "Supermicro"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSVersion      "A12"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSReleaseDate  "02/22/2010"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSReleaseMajor  2
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSReleaseMinor  3
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSFirmwareMajor 2
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiBIOSFirmwareMinor 3
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiSystemVendor     "Supermicro"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiSystemProduct    "X7SBL"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiSystemVersion    "A12"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiSystemSerial     "0123456789"
%VSETED% %CFG_PATH%/DmiSystemFamily     "X86-based PC"

Regards
João Olival
OfficeLan

[darose]

Sigh. Been trying on and off for months to get this to work, but still no luck. Perhaps someone here might be able to point out what I'm doing wrong?

I've got a dual boot machine, and am trying to boot the windows partition in a VM from inside of Linux. Not happening.

Here's what I've got configured:

• I created 2 vmdk's - one for the windows partition, and one for a shared partition that's accessible by both boots:

  Code: Select all

  sudo VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename winxp-drive-c.vmdk -rawdisk /dev/sda -partitions 2 -relative -mbr winxp.mbr
  sudo VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename winxp-drive-e.vmdk -rawdisk /dev/sda -partitions 3 -relative
  

• I set the appropriate extra data on the VM:

  Code: Select all

  #!/bin/bash
  VM_NAME="WinXP" # Name of your Virtual Machine
  VSETED="VBoxManage setextradata $VM_NAME"
  CFG_PATH="VBoxInternal/Devices/pcbios/0/Config"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSVendor       "Dell Inc."
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSVersion      "A06"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseDate  "10/10/2008"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseMajor  0
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSReleaseMinor  6
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSFirmwareMajor 0
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiBIOSFirmwareMinor 6
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemVendor     "Dell Inc."
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemProduct    "Precision M4400                 "
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemVersion    "<EMPTY>"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemSerial     "DCNZNH1"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemUuid       "44454C4C-4300-104E-805A-C4C04F4E4831"
  $VSETED $CFG_PATH/DmiSystemFamily     " "
  

  (And yes, the extra spaces in DmiSystemProduct and DmiSystemFamily are copied verbatim from the dmidecode output.)
• I tried enabling just one virtual NIC - first with the MAC address matching the LAN card, then matching the WiFi card. Then I tried with both virtual NIC's enabled simultaneously.
• My VM is configured as follows:

  Code: Select all

  Sun VirtualBox Command Line Management Interface Version 3.1.4
  (C) 2005-2010 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
  All rights reserved.
  
  Name:            WinXP
  Guest OS:        Windows XP
  UUID:            87396b8d-0a78-4fa1-8f9d-a7003d90c003
  Config file:     /home/darose/.VirtualBox/Machines/WinXP/WinXP.xml
  Hardware UUID:   87396b8d-0a78-4fa1-8f9d-a7003d90c003
  Memory size:     512MB
  VRAM size:       64MB
  Number of CPUs:  1
  Synthetic Cpu:   off
  CPUID overrides: None
  Boot menu mode:  message and menu
  Boot Device (1): Floppy
  Boot Device (2): DVD
  Boot Device (3): HardDisk
  Boot Device (4): Not Assigned
  ACPI:            on
  IOAPIC:          on
  PAE:             off
  Time offset:     0 ms
  Hardw. virt.ext: off
  Hardw. virt.ext exclusive: on
  Nested Paging:   off
  VT-x VPID:       off
  State:           running (since 2010-03-03T19:09:13.673000000)
  Monitor count:   1
  3D Acceleration: off
  2D Video Acceleration: off
  Teleporter Enabled: off
  Teleporter Port: 0
  Teleporter Address: 
  Teleporter Password: 
  Storage Controller Name (0):            IDE Controller
  Storage Controller Type (0):            ICH6
  Storage Controller Instance Number (0): 0
  Storage Controller Max Port Count (0):  2
  Storage Controller Port Count (0):      2
  Storage Controller Name (1):            SATA Controller
  Storage Controller Type (1):            IntelAhci
  Storage Controller Instance Number (1): 0
  Storage Controller Max Port Count (1):  30
  Storage Controller Port Count (1):      1
  IDE Controller (0, 0): /home/darose/temp/winxp-drive-c.vmdk (UUID: 5c746d40-41f3-4507-b5df-f831a0e810b0)
  IDE Controller (0, 1): /home/darose/temp/winxp-drive-e.vmdk (UUID: 5b753aac-7895-44ae-a5ea-6b787c572049)
  IDE Controller (1, 0): /dev/sr0 (UUID: 00445644-0000-0000-2f64-65762f737230) (passthrough enabled)
  NIC 1:           MAC: 002170C16BA6, Attachment: NAT, Cable connected: on, Trace: off (file: none), Type: Am79C973, Reported speed: 0 Mbps
  NIC 2:           MAC: 00225F2AC801, Attachment: none, Cable connected: on, Trace: off (file: none), Type: Am79C973, Reported speed: 0 Mbps
  NIC 3:           disabled
  NIC 4:           disabled
  NIC 5:           disabled
  NIC 6:           disabled
  NIC 7:           disabled
  NIC 8:           disabled
  UART 1:          disabled
  UART 2:          disabled
  Audio:           disabled
  Clipboard Mode:  Bidirectional
  Video mode:      1280x1024x32
  VRDP:            disabled
  USB:             disabled
  
  USB Device Filters:
  
  <none>
  
  Available remote USB devices:
  
  <none>
  
  Currently Attached USB Devices:
  
  <none>
  
  Shared folders:  <none>
  
  VRDP Connection:    not active
  Clients so far:     0
  
  Guest:
  
  Statistics update:                   disabled
  

I've tried a zillion variations on everything, but nothing seems to work. Every time I boot the VM it tells me that it needs to re-activate WinXP. This does not happen when booting that partition natively into Windows.

I think I'm really close to getting this right (since the VM boots), but I'm figuring there's some small tweak or setting that I've got wrong here that's causing it to not recognize the hardware properly and force me into reactivation.

Anyone have any ideas what I might be doing wrong?

TIA!

[darose]

I notice that the output of the Windows MGADiag.exe tool contains the following:

Code: Select all

OEM Activation 1.0 Data-->
BIOS string matches: yes
Marker string from BIOS: 16B58:Dell Inc|16B58:Microsoft Corporation
Marker string from OEMBIOS.DAT: Dell System,Dell Computer,Dell System,Dell System

Could that be of some relevance here?

[MarkCranness]

I notice that the output of the Windows MGADiag.exe tool contains the following:

Code: Select all

OEM Activation 1.0 Data-->
BIOS string matches: yes
Marker string from BIOS: 16B58:Dell Inc|16B58:Microsoft Corporation
Marker string from OEMBIOS.DAT: Dell System,Dell Computer,Dell System,Dell System

Could that be of some relevance here?

Yes. Did you install XP in the partition yourself, or was it pre-installed by Dell?
If preinstalled by Dell, then it is pre-activated using SLP System Locked Preinstallation. That uses strings in the BIOS (not DMI data) to identify the BIOS and avoid activation.
The VirtualBox BIOS does not have those strings, and causes re-activation.
It may activate with no problem, or it might not.

[jss]

Hello, please read my posts http://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/2784#comment:5

I've just done it. I now have my preinstalled windows XP with SLP running virtualized on VB hosted by my ASUS A8Js with Ubuntu 9.10 without asking for activation. And both versions work, meaning, a P2V or a new installation.

As a side-comment, I believe this does not violate any licensing terms because the hardware is the original for the preinstall and I'm only keeping one virtual instance of the OS.

I had already made it with vmplayer with a modified bios and the clause "bios440.filename=", as you can read on the link above, but I really wanted VB.

In my case, the string to be included in the bios file (/usr/lib/virtualbox/VBoxDD2.so) to be found by the SLP mechanism is "ASUS_FLASH" and must be sitting near the top of the BIOS. I checked that it exists on my laptop BIOS. So, I overwrote it on the area containg "00" a few bytes before the bios date. I don't think it collides with any other significant data, at least it's working well.

I'm using VB 3.1.4 and, for this version, the BIOS date string "06/23/99" can be found at the file offset 0x17bc5. Look for this string with your hex editor; just before this is a 5 byte data field, don't touch it; before this field, there's a big area containing 0x00, use this area to overwrite your string.

The only problem is that you'll have to do this each time a VB upgrade comes out, until VB has an external bios or another mechanism to insert the string.

If you want to do a clean install to test this before trying it with your P2V, you must have, or build, a recovery CD which usually isn't provided with a preinstalled system. At least, in my case, all I had was a disk image which is not suitable. So, I recovered all the OS setup files that were sitting on c:\windows\i386, slipstreamed to SP3, added some needed files for boot and made a bootable recovery CD. All these instructions, together with the streams needed for several brands and the important oembios files to be included ith the CD, in case you don't have the preinstall files, can be searched for on "forums dot mydigitallife dot com".

Enjoy,
jss

[darose]

Yes. Did you install XP in the partition yourself, or was it pre-installed by Dell?
If preinstalled by Dell, then it is pre-activated using SLP System Locked Preinstallation. That uses strings in the BIOS (not DMI data) to identify the BIOS and avoid activation.
The VirtualBox BIOS does not have those strings, and causes re-activation.
It may activate with no problem, or it might not.

Bad news is that it was pre-installed, so it probably is using SLP and I'm kinda hosed here. (Bummer that VB can't emulate this situation!)

More bad news is that all this tinkering has screwed up my windows partition and it looks like I'll have to do a re-install. (Doh!)



Thanks for the help, Mark.