Disk2VHD to VHD to VirtualBox

[dchall8]

Noob here.

I have VirtualBox version 4.3.12r93733
I think my search for this question was comprehensive, but it seems like it should be a FAQ issue, so maybe I missed something.

I have a new computer with Intel i7 running Windows 7 Home Premium from a 1TB HD. The old computer is a 32bit Pentium from 2007, also with Win 7 Home Premium on a 250 GB HD. I ran Disk2VHD on the old computer and would like to run it as a VM on the new one. Before running Disk2VHD I deleted a bunch of stuff and ran MyDefrag on it. The resulting .VHD file is 91GB.

The VirtualBox manual says you just import the VHD as an appliance, but .VHD does not seem to be one of the formats allowed for importing. It is looking for a .ova or .ovf file. Is there a tutorial somewhere that shows how to do what I'm trying to do?

[BillG]

You do not use import. You have a virtual hard drive (your .vhd file) which contains the files from your old PC.

Copy the .vhd file to your new computer. Create a new Windows 7 32-bit virtual machine (click New in the VirtualBox Manager window) and when you get to the virtual disk section, select the option to use an existing hard drive, browse to your .vdi file and select it.

[loukingjr]

The VirtualBox manual says you just import the VHD as an appliance, but .VHD does not seem to be one of the formats allowed for importing.

I don't believe the manual states you can import a VHD file as an appliance anywhere.

[mpack]

And I would just like to add... there is a big difference between supporting the VHD format, and being able to run any software that might be stored on a disk. You should expect that it'll be a struggle to get Windows to boot successfully, and if you succeed it will want to be reactivated because of all the hardware changes.

I can understand wanting to keep an image of your old PC around for reference, just in case you forgot to move something. Remember that accessing the contents of the drive (e.g. attached as a 2nd drive to another VM) is a simpler proposition than trying to get that Windows image to boot.

A final note: VHD is not a reliable format. I would suggest cloning it with CloneVDI before you start. This gives you a disk in VirtualBox's native VDI format. Keep the VHD on a USB drive as a backup - for a while anyway.

[dchall8]

Thank you BillG. I got through that and have something to work with. Now it's in a boot loop so I'm going to read up on boot loops. Apparently those are common, because there is a lot of hits in my search. Watch these pages for another question on boot loops if I can't figure it out.

loukingjr, you are correct. I believe the manual is just a touch ambiguous in that area, but technically it does not say you can import a VHD.

mpack, DUDE! Thanks for that link. CloneVDI is running right now. Did I read your instructions right? Can I run CloneVDI instead of running Disk2VHD to make a VDI of my original computer?

[mpack]

Did I read your instructions right? Can I run CloneVDI instead of running Disk2VHD to make a VDI of my original computer?

You can, but it isn't very user friendly in that role, and there's nothing extra to be gained - converting the VHD will be easier and produces the same result.

[dchall8]

Thank you mpack. I did get the same result (boot loop) running the VDI as I got running the VHD.

I've read all I could find on boot loops and will be posting yet another question.

[mpack]

Boot loops are easy to deal with: ideally you turn off the "Auto reboot on error" feature in Windows (*) before you image it, or you can tell VirtualBox not to honor the reboot request: see section 12.3.4 of the user manual. That will allow you to see the correct BSOD code. Quite often the problem is attempting to boot from a SATA drive (wrong SATA chipset), in which case switching the disk to an IDE controller might fix it.

(*) I normally turn this feature off on my physical PCs too - I want to see what causes a crash, not have it covered up.

[dchall8]

Thanks again. Already posted the boot loop question. BSOD screenshot is inline and Log File is attached to that post.

If it turns out to be the IDE/SATA issue, how do I change that? Looking at settings it is not intuitively obvious. I'll spend the next few minutes (hours?) rereading chapter 12 and then looking for how to change to IDE.

Thanks again, and again.

[dchall8]

Well well. Mpack you are, as they say, the MAN (unless you are a woman).

Figured out the IDE SATA thing in the settings. I deleted the vdi from the SATA controller and added it to the IDE controller. It booted. Thank you thank you thank you!!! I will go ahead and report that on my new thread and maybe help someone else. Full credit to you, mpack. Thanks again.

[mpack]

I'm glad you've got it working. From memory I can't remember anyone else reporting a successful P2V of a Win7 Home Premium system. It's nice to have it confirmed that it is possible.

[dchall8]

Today I had to revalidate my Windows 7 Home Premium product key on the virtual machine. Interestingly, Belarc Advisor pulled up the product key for Windows Vista, the original OS on this hardware. WinkeyFinder found the Windows 7 key right away. I wonder if this means the old machine will sputter on the Win 7 validation if I need to turn it back on???

Also when I revalidated the Windows key I lost all my Firefox tabs, so I had to go through that process with the sessionstore.js file. I ended up pasting the contents of the text from the old sessionstore backup into the current sessionstore. Simply changing sessionstore.bak to sessionstore.js did not work for some reason.

I had read that you should be using Win 7 Pro to make the Virtual Machine or VirtualBox work. I just ignored that and pressed on as if I knew what I was doing. Definitely there were no shenanigans pulled to make Home Premium work. When I had the trouble that started this post, I was careful to mention Win 7 HP in case that raised any red flags with anyone.

[mpack]

If you have any questions about Windows licensing then you really need to take those up with Microsoft. Any answers we might give are meaningless.

[Dr.Zuse]

Hi, I have the same problem: message: "No boot medium" after starting VM of Win8 copy with Disk2VHD.
Reading this thread thought I would solve the problem but it still not working.

mpack is correct: there are 2 things that make sense:

1.) Using Disk2VHD must include all partitions.
2.) Set the controller from SATA to IDE

But in my case it is not working and I assume there is at least one other thing that makes sense.

First the details and then what I have tried so far:

OS: Win 8.1 / 64 bit
Computer: Lenovo B50 / BIOS Bootmode UEFI
Virtualbox ver 4.3.20
Disk2VHD v2.01

Done so far:

I created a VHD copy with Disk2VHD with all partitions except the one where I writing the VHD file to.
Some partitions like the Win bootpartition are not visible in the tool but I assume tool must include them as well.
Without the boot partition a bootable image is impossible. I tried several combinations. No effect.

Of course I swapped the disk to IDE in both procedures:
- creating a new virtual machine with correct OS and "do not add virtual hard drive" and add the VHD file as
IDE drive later.
- creating a new virtual machine with correct OS and "use an existing virtual drive directly" and remove the
disk as SATA and add as IDE.
No affect.

After that I converted the VHD to VDI with CloneVDI like mpack said. No effect. Still the message: No boot medium found.
It is clear that if the VHD is incorrect the tool cannot fix this.
So, the main question is: Is the VHD incorrect or are the VirtualBox settings?

I was just about on give up (after testing if swearing would make any difference) when I noticed that my BIOS has boot mode UEFI and that VirtualBox has a setting: system -> motherboard -> "Enable UFI for special OSes only".
Well, Win8.1 is not that special but at least something is changing!!!

It starts a boot attempt.
The screen shows memory counting and then:
"BLK1: Alias(s):
PciRoot (0x0) /Pci (0x1,0x1) /Ata (0x0)/HD(1,GPT,03F18D54-BCF5-4A10-A7D2-3E
...
...
BKL8...
Press ESC in 0 seconds to skip startup.nsh or any other key to continue.
2.0 Shell> "

This is the UEFI environment shell.
Not that this life makes easier. What I understand so far is that this shell is looking where to boot from.
But a this point I am lost...
How can I make it boot?

Suggestions are welcome!

[mpack]

The OP said nothing about "No bootable medium found", so you do not have the same problem. You have the problem which the error message says you have: you don't have a bootable disk attached to the VM. Please open a new topic to discuss it.