Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

The Fish — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 02:22:59 GMT

Hi Ben,

I know this post is ages old but I was wondering if you could answer a long-standing question I have had. I have used the SysInternals Disk2Vhd.exe tool a number of times to do emergency P2V migrations. One time the physical machine had a failing RAID array and another time it was part of a messy divorce and I had to get "his" software off "her" server.

Anyway, my question has to do with the "cleanup HAL for Virtual PC" checkbox. What exactly does this do? and when should it be used? In one of the cases described above the target hypervisor was Virtual Server 2005. In another instance it actually ran on Virtual PC for a while (not long). What if the target hypervisor is Hyper-V? Should I be using the "Virtual PC" checkbox?

What if I am using Disk2Vhd.exe for doing backups? Here the primary concern would be getting a bootable/restorable image. Could using this checkbox cook the resulting VHD making it non-bootable?

Best regards,

Some guy.

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Rajesh Vankayala — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 15:44:06 GMT

I have installed Disk2vhd in Vista utltimate o/s.we have 3 dirves c,d and e .Each 40GB size.

I have added 15 files (Size 100 MB) in E:Drive and Disk2vhd application is in D:Drive. I have made .VHD snapshot of E Drive and store this file (Test.vhd) in my D Drive.

When i check size of this created vhd file , it seems to be 3.74 GB.I surprized because my E:Drive space required size is 100MB.

And my C:Drive size is 16 GB.

Can you plz let me know how it is possible ..??

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Gooner85 — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 10:36:26 GMT

Is it also possible to use a image created with Disk2VHD on Virtual PC 2007?

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

JD — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:47:53 GMT

Why can't you just create the new VM, and attach the vhd to a SCSI interface?

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Meitzi — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:37:07 GMT

If you have problems when moving Windows Server 2003 (SCSI hard drives) physical server to virtual, check this:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314082 (yes, this also applies to Windows Server 2003)

You need add IDE drivers. Easiest way to do this is before "virtualing" but of course it is possible to modify offline reg file if you need to.

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Jan Hendrik — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 08:55:52 GMT

Windows Server 2003 R2 x64 (with SP2) - "error loading operating system" <= same error here :(

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Luke — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 07:51:19 GMT

I'm having the same problem as Paolo and David but with Windows Server 2003 R2 x64 (with SP2) - "error loading operating system" and the repair option of the setup kit did not make any difference... any "hack"/workaround?

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

David — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:15:09 GMT

I am having the EXACT same problem as Paolo above . . .

# re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

1 -I tried Disk2vhd v1.0 from vista sp2 to vhd in hyper-v and worked ok.

2- I tried Disk2vhd v1.0 from Windows 2003 server sp1 to vhd in hyper-v but it doesn't work (error loading operating system).

Any idea for make this vhd bootable ?

any ideas?

-David

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

john kelly — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 19:10:54 GMT

Re: Injecting files & making registry changes to allow a P2V to boot. would this work?

On W7, copy vhd to local drive, then

Diskpart

select vdisk file="path to .vhd"

attach vdisk

[seems to auto assign drive letters]

Then copy files to mounted .vhd in appropriate locations.

Regedit -> load hive -> [edit registry] -> unload hive

DISKPART> detach vdisk

re: Disk2vhd v1.0 now available

Benjamin Armstrong — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:53:27 GMT

All -

I do have notes (somewhere around here) on what you need to do to make a system compatible post migration. I will try to dig them up and write it out. In the mean time - if you search my blog for "Tips for Migrating" you will find a series that I posted a while ago on migrating XP using a disk copy.

Aidan Finn -

The tool is "unsupported", but the VHDs generated by it are supported (if you can follow that logic).

Corrado Cavalli -

Check: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd799299(WS.10).aspx

Sejong -

Windows backup does not preserve partition / boot sector / other disk information that is preserved by this tool.

Cheers,

Ben