virtualbox.org

I recently had a hard drive crash on my main linux box where I was running vmware hosting XP for my wife to use. I decided to jump to Virtualbox when I reinstalled the system after I fixed the hard drive. Remember I couldn't run the vmware machine again to remove the vmware tools. I managed to use Acronis Truiemage with universal restore to recover the XP system into a new Virtualbox setup and got it running. I then manually removed all references to vmware in the system and registry. I installed virtualbox tools and got most of the system running but for one issue. I cannot get the mouse to load the correct drivers and to top it off no matter what I do the system thinks it needs the vmmouse.sys driver meaning it thinks it has a vmware mouse attached. I've tried every which way I can think of to install the mouse using the virtualbox drivers but nothing works. I get a new hardware found ps2 mouse message twice when I boot up and then one about needing the vmmouse.sys driver from the vmware disk. Can anyone tell me what I have to remove to stop the system from trying to install ANYTHING vmware??? The mouse works even in a windowed system but the wheel doesn't work and I REALLY hate seeing the warning message everytime I reboot.


HELP!!!!!!!

The best idea would have been to do a fresh install of XP under VirtualBox rather than trying to fiddle with the existing image. You can always retore your files with the tranfer wizard.

You always have problems if you don't or can't remove the VM tools (or the additions for VBox or VPC) before you move to different virtualization software.

I may do that but it will take a while to gather up all of the software. I'd rather not have to do that so I may just live with the complaints from the wife

I can't believe that there isn't info any where on WHY there is such a problem with uninstalling vmware after the fact. It has to be either in an ini I missed or some obscure registry entry.

Check device manager for hidden devices, it might give you an answer. You can also check the OEMx.fin files in \Windows\inf. Might have something in them too.

DING DING DING DING We have a winner!!!!! I'd already checked and removed a few hidden devices that were vmware related but after finding 9 oemx.inf files in the inf directory with vmware in them and removing them, ok being the geek I am I moved them to a holding file first, the mouse issue went away and then reinstalling the virtualbox additions I got my scroll wheel back!!!

So to recap what I did to remove vmware driver issues when switching over to virtualbox without being able to uninstall vmware additions from within the vmware machine:

1. Removed all vmware related regentries.
2. Removed all vmware related driver files.
3. Checked all ini files to remove any vmware references.
4. Removed any hidden devices related to vmware.
5. Remove and oemx.inf files in the WINDOWS/inf directory.
6. Reinstall virtualbox additions.


Whew.......

Thanks again.