Xen users - Jun 2009 - run a VM from a previous physical disk install ?

Hi All,

I have a machine that was installed with WinXP, I re-sized the disk so WinXP has
a very small disk and installed linux on the newly freed up disk partition.  If
I boot from the partition (via grub) the old windows image works just fine, but
as I only need to access it on occasion I''d rather not have to re-boot
my machine to get to it.  So - is there a way I can use the already installed
version of WinXP as an installed VM image and run it ?
 
I tried with the following config file (at the end of this mail) but I got these
errors:

	Booting from Hard Disk...
	Boot from Hard Disk failed: could not read the boot disk
	FATAL: No bootable device

Is it just that the virtual devices in the VM are not compatible with the real
devices that the image expects ?

Or do I have to go and get something like PlateSpin powerconvert ?  Any
open-source VtoP tools ?

Thanks.

Joe

Just in case, here is my VM config file:

name = "WinXP"
uuid = "694f0193-b8ec-d1ff-3d97-18731b540008"
maxmem = 384
memory = 384
vcpus = 1
builder = "hvm"
kernel = "/usr/lib/xen/boot/hvmloader"
boot = "c"
pae = 0
acpi = 0
apic = 0
localtime = 0
on_poweroff = "destroy"
on_reboot = "restart"
on_crash = "restart"
device_model = "/usr/lib64/xen/bin/qemu-dm"
sdl = 0
vnc = 1
vncunused = 0
vncdisplay = "2"
disk = [ "/dev/sda2,hda,w" ]
vif = [  ]
serial = "pty"


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On Fri, Jun 5, 2009 at 5:58 PM, Joe Armstrong<jarmstrong@postpath.com>
wrote:
>        Booting from Hard Disk...
>        Boot from Hard Disk failed: could not read the boot disk
>        FATAL: No bootable device
>
> Is it just that the virtual devices in the VM are not compatible with the
real devices that the image expects ?
first, windows is expecting a hard disk, which starts with a boot
sector and a partition table, but Xen is giving it (as per your
config) a partition, with just the NTFS filesystem.

i don''t know of any way to insert a suitable partition table, short of
doing a full copy into a new device.




-- 
Javier

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I would try showing the windows guest the whole physical drive
as I think windows needs to see the partition table.  Just be careful
to not modify the partition table or non-windows partitions from
windows.

    disk = [ "phy:/dev/sda,hda,w" ]

-----Original Message-----
From: Joe Armstrong [mailto:jarmstrong@postpath.com] 
Sent: Friday, June 05, 2009 3:58 PM
To: xen-users@lists.xensource.com
Subject: [Xen-users] run a VM from a previous physical disk install ?

Hi All,

I have a machine that was installed with WinXP, I re-sized the disk so
WinXP has a very small disk and installed linux on the newly freed up
disk partition.  If I boot from the partition (via grub) the old windows
image works just fine, but as I only need to access it on occasion I''d
rather not have to re-boot my machine to get to it.  So - is there a way
I can use the already installed version of WinXP as an installed VM
image and run it ?
 
I tried with the following config file (at the end of this mail) but I
got these errors:

	Booting from Hard Disk...
	Boot from Hard Disk failed: could not read the boot disk
	FATAL: No bootable device

Is it just that the virtual devices in the VM are not compatible with
the real devices that the image expects ?

Or do I have to go and get something like PlateSpin powerconvert ?  Any
open-source VtoP tools ?

Thanks.

Joe

Just in case, here is my VM config file:

name = "WinXP"
uuid = "694f0193-b8ec-d1ff-3d97-18731b540008"
maxmem = 384
memory = 384
vcpus = 1
builder = "hvm"
kernel = "/usr/lib/xen/boot/hvmloader"
boot = "c"
pae = 0
acpi = 0
apic = 0
localtime = 0
on_poweroff = "destroy"
on_reboot = "restart"
on_crash = "restart"
device_model = "/usr/lib64/xen/bin/qemu-dm"
sdl = 0
vnc = 1
vncunused = 0
vncdisplay = "2"
disk = [ "/dev/sda2,hda,w" ]
vif = [  ]
serial = "pty"


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On Sat, Jun 6, 2009 at 6:07 AM, David Morris<dmorris@propel.com>
wrote:
>
> I would try showing the windows guest the whole physical drive
> as I think windows needs to see the partition table.  Just be careful
> to not modify the partition table or non-windows partitions from
> windows.
>
>    disk = [ "phy:/dev/sda,hda,w" ]
>
Yes, that would be most space-efficient. Dont forget to read this as
well : http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Migrate_Windows
There''s one caveat though: if you accidently choose linux entry (the
one you''re currently booting), it could mean disaster as
dom0''s
filesystem will be mounted twice (on physical and virtual) and it
almost always create data corruption. It''s usually best to create a
new domU with its own storage.

For P2V, I usually do it semi-manually with ntfsclone and ntfsreloc
(works great for XP and Win2003). You could also google xen windows
p2v, where one of the results is this :
http://www.ruizs.org/archives/63

-- 
Fajar

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