Trouble using system drive from previous computer.

[mpack]

do I check the option for "Prepare for use in Virtual PC" or not?

Not. Adding Virtual PC (2007) drivers into a VirtualBox VM will not help at all.

I am now in possession of a Win7Pro ISO file (4GB). I am quite confused on how to proceed with that. Can anyone give a quick step-by-step in my case?

Proceed in what sense? Are you asking about creating a new Win7 VM from an install disk? Chapter 1 of the manual deals with that, and if you run into any problems then please create a new topic to discuss them - i.e. one issue one topic. If you are asking how to run a repair... I'm not sure that's even possible since I don't think your disk was ever damaged, the boot manager is simply not present.

preferred way to build the VHD for this process?

The preference is to avoid VHD entirely. It was a badly designed and error prone format even when it was new.

If you are asking how to do a better job of virtualizing the Dell, I think frankly you are wasting your time. You had a complex boot mechanism (boot manager located on secondary drive) that you don't know the details of, making it rather difficult to reproduce. As others have mentioned I think your best bet is to create a new Win7 VM from scratch using your ISO, probably with a new license not tied to a Dell BIOS, and then attach your VHDs as secondary drives until you get the data off.

However, if you want to persist with the P2V task then you need to reproduce the old PC more precisely, i.e. image both drives, add both to the VM, and make sure "physicaldrive0" and "physicaldrive1" are properly identified. Do not mess with EFI or SATA - leave both disabled. This is all a bit of a mess, which is why I personally would prefer to start from scratch.

[mpack]

And another thought: if creating a VM from scratch, why does it need to be Win7? Win10 will be better supported for years to come, and came in 32bit flavors if that is a consideration.

[scottgus1]

I am now in possession of a Win7Pro ISO file

I'll just toss in here, that you can put the ISO in the VM's Optical Drive, then boot the VM to the "CD". Since the hard disk does not find a bootable OS, the VM may boot to the CD automatically.

Then web-search how to run a repair install on Windows 7. The procedure is the same whether in a physical or a virtual computer.

If the installer can find and make sense of the installed OS, it should be able to put (or you can instruct it to put, per web-searched instructions) a proper boot record pointing to the OS on the VHD.

If the VM can be repaired and boot, then there you go! Some fixing or re-installing of the installed programs may be necessary. Some re-doing of updates may be necessary (See https://download.wsusoffline.net/, version 11.9 for an offline Windows Update process for 7 that is a lot easier than waiting for the Windows Updates window to load itself up.) Or you can simply keep the un-updated reinstalled OS off the internet. Then make the VHD a VDI per Mpack above.

If the VM cannot repair itself, then it may be time to scrap the project and press on.

[JJJones]

@mpack

The entire goal is to be able to boot my old system drive which, as far as I can tell, is still in original condition in order to run installed software (Adobe RoboHelp v10, etc) that cannot be found or replaced anymore.

• Gotcha on the no Virtual PC checkbox. It was mentioned in a previous reply (or separate topic), so I wanted to make sure.

• I have an old Win7 system hard drive; from a Dell consumer computer. I need to boot it in order to run installed software that simply cannot be found anymore and reinstalled. This is the Day 1 issue. Creating a new Win7 VM does not solve this problem. I have complete access to the old OS hard drive attached to my new computer; can access all files; but cannot run the programs that were installed on there. So, creating a new Win7 VM and attaching a VHD is not a solution.

• Ok - avoid VHD. How do I create another format? Which format (@scottgus1 mentions VDI)? What tool do I use? Disk2VHD seems to support only VHD or VHDX. This may have already been mentioned and if so, sorry I have forgotten; a bit lost in the weeds right now. I have a day job as software developer and this is stealing cycles from it; which is probably the case for all others here also.

@scottgus1

• How to convert a VHD into a VDI?

This will be my Step 1 effort.

Ready to press on if this doesn't work!

[scottgus1]

avoid VHD. How do I create another format? Which format (@scottgus1 mentions VDI)? What tool do I use? Disk2VHD seems to support only VHD or VHDX

Using Disk2VHD is a solid good tool to make the copy of the drive into a VHD, but it does leave you with a VHD, which under some circumstances can be unstable. So you should clone it into a more robust format. VDI is Virtualbox's native format and very robust. VMDK is also robust and could work too, but VDI has the greatest support in Virtualbox.

How to convert a VHD into a VDI?

Use "CloneVDI", mentioned very early in the topic: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=105832#p516648.

[fth0]

How to convert a VHD into a VDI?

For example, you could use VBoxManage clonemedium for that.

[JJJones]

Thx @fth0 and @scottgus1

As I start to create the VHD using disk2vhd, I now realize that I am unsure which partitions to include in the VHD build (that I will later convert to VDI).

Below are pics of how Windows Disk Management sees my drives/partitions and how Disk2VHD sees them.

Do I select all of the Yellow Highlighted volumes in disk2vhd for building my VHD? If not, then what do you suggest please? This seems to be important to get correct and I am not at all sure which should be included in the VHD and which should be left out.

This should be the last question before I am able to go all the way through the disk2vhd --> Convert2VDI --> boot with ISO and run Repair process.

Disk-mgmt-2.png (48.9 KiB) Viewed 1670 times

disk2vhd.png (30.93 KiB) Viewed 1670 times

[mpack]

You image the entire disks. All of them.

Once you have a working VM - and a backup of same - then you can start to delete unwanted partitions.

[JJJones]

Oops. I see that the 96MB and 604MB partitions shown in disk2vhd belong to the new SSD C:\ drive with Win11. So I think I should not include those, and only those highlighted in yellow below.

Correct?

disk2vhd.png (30.64 KiB) Viewed 1668 times

[JJJones]

You image the entire disks. All of them.

Once you have a working VM - and a backup of same - then you can start to delete unwanted partitions.

@mpack I am confused by this response. I suppose that you don't mean that I should build the VHD including my current Win11 system disk; and not my external USB expansion drive for backups.

Rather, I assume by "All of them", you mean the two hard drives from the old Win7 computer. Which are represented by the highlighted partitions in my last post.

Sorry if I am being dense, just making sure I understand and build the correct VHD.

[JJJones]

Ok - the confusion continues. I went ahead and took a best guess and built the VHD based on the settings you see below.

disk2vhd.png (33.52 KiB) Viewed 1665 times

And this resulted in the following 2 VHD files being created.

vhd-files.png (6 KiB) Viewed 1665 times

I did not expect that; I expected one file.

Assuming I convert both files to VDI. How do I build/define the VM? Do I include both created files?

Add the Win7 ISO as the optical drive I boot the VM from initially?

[mpack]

If you image two drives than two image files is exactly what I would expect. Now you add both images to one VM - after converting each to VDI. The point is to match the recipe of the VM to that of the original PC.

I can't give you any clues beyond that, e.g. how to identify which drive should be first on the IDE controller. You'll just have to try it.

And I remind you: I don't expect this to work, because I'm not sure an MBR boot manager can reliably identify partitions accurately across multiple drives when the controllers have changed.

[fth0]

Independent of your current attempts, another question came to mind:

When you deleted the RECOVERY (E:) partition early on, did you perhaps delete two partitions instead of only one? I'm asking because there usually is a System-reserved partition (~100 MB, no drive letter) containing the now missing boot loader.

[JJJones]

Independent of your current attempts, another question came to mind:

When you deleted the RECOVERY (E:) partition early on, did you perhaps delete two partitions instead of only one? I'm asking because there usually is a System-reserved partition (~100 MB, no drive letter) containing the now missing boot loader.

I feel pretty sure the answer to that is "NO". 3 weeks ago. And even after I deleted the partition using Windows Disk Management, it showed as unallocated. And restored to the same size. There was no other partition/chunk showing that had been deleted/removed/unallocated. So, that would seem to support the idea that this WAS indeed the only partition I acted on in this way.

I now understand @mpack comments on "All Drives" and how to add them to the VM. Trying this now - FWIW. Stay tuned.

[JJJones]

Ok - I have configured the VM as shown below and it has booted into the Optical Drive's Win7 ISO "Install Win7".

vm1.png (78.39 KiB) Viewed 1559 times

I have clicked on the Repair option and gotten to this screen.
Chose the first option button and clicked Load Drivers

Now it is asking for the installation media for the device.

vm2.png (72.99 KiB) Viewed 1559 times

Not sure what file(s) I am looking for and where to look.

So sorry everyone. I am a software developer, not a system admin, OS installer, etc.