Help~install from i386 on VM on ramdisk

[stevedave]

OK I set up a 1gig Ramdisk drive with the hopes to run an XP VM at work.

I don't have an XP disk only the I386 file, how do I install using this on a VM?

Also running the VM from a Ramdisk drive will not use any harddrive recourses correct? (5400rpm laptop hard dive + VM = lame)


running Windows7 64bit if that matters any.

Thanks,

 

[alphanumeric]

You say "i386 file" do you mean i386 directory from the CD? You need the entire folder to install XP. If you have that folder I believe the file you run is winnt32.exe. You are still going to use some hard drive space for the VM image file. It's got to save it somewhere so it can load it when you launch the VM OS and load it into RAM, and save it when you shut it down.

 

[stevedave]

You say "i386 file" do you mean i386 directory from the CD? You need the entire folder to install XP. If you have that folder I believe the file you run is winnt32.exe. You are still going to use some hard drive space for the VM image file. It's got to save it somewhere so it can load it when you launch the VM OS and load it into RAM, and save it when you shut it down.

I plan on moving the VM image file to the the ramdisk at start of day and off the ram drive at end of day.

yeah I have the i386 directory, how would I install that on the .vhd? I open the vm and it ask for a bootable device which the i386 directory is not.

 

[alphanumeric]

I don't know, I haven't played around with a virtual machine in quite a while. I always installed from a full CD. If you only have the i386 folder all the bits that make it bootable are missing. All I can tell you is from DOS you run winnt.exe and from a windows environment you run winnt32.exe. Why is it you only have the i386 folder?

 

[stevedave]

I don't know, I haven't played around with a virtual machine in quite a while. I always installed from a full CD. If you only have the i386 folder all the bits that make it bootable are missing. All I can tell you is from DOS you run winnt.exe and from a windows environment you run winnt32.exe. Why is it you only have the i386 folder?

It's how my company stores it's install files, not sure why. They don't have any ISO's which I am normally used to.

 

[alphanumeric]

That seems like a strange way to do things? I don't think you are going to get very far without a full ISO file or a bootable CD/DVD. But, like I said I haven't played around with a virtual machine in quite a while. Somebody may be able to tell you how to get around that, I don't know.

 

[Demon10000]

You won't be able to do anything without booting the VM to an alternate OS. I would recommend WinPE, but if you don't plan on using it again, a plain old DOS boot disk will work (get a Win98 or higher one from Bootdisk.com).

What I would do...

1. boot the VM to DOS and Prepare the hard disk. Fdisk, create the partition, format it and reboot the VM.
2. When the VM reboots to DOS mode again, copy the i386 directory to C:\ so you have your install files on C:\i386.
3. Change to the C: drive and go into the C:\i386 directory. Run Winnt.exe to start the setup.


If you find a PE environment, it's easier (and will probably install faster). You can do the following.

1. Prepare the disk like normal.
2. Copy the setup files to C:\i386 and run setup.exe to start the installation.

Regardless of the scenario, you can run the install from wherever you want. I used to copy the i386 directly to the machine and run from there, that way if the machine needed any files it would know where to get them.


Once you're done you can save the VHD and move it to wherever you want...

 

[stevedave]

You won't be able to do anything without booting the VM to an alternate OS. I would recommend WinPE, but if you don't plan on using it again, a plain old DOS boot disk will work (get a Win98 or higher one from Bootdisk.com).

What I would do...

1. boot the VM to DOS and Prepare the hard disk. Fdisk, create the partition, format it and reboot the VM.
2. When the VM reboots to DOS mode again, copy the i386 directory to C:\ so you have your install files on C:\i386.
3. Change to the C: drive and go into the C:\i386 directory. Run Winnt.exe to start the setup.


If you find a PE environment, it's easier (and will probably install faster). You can do the following.

1. Prepare the disk like normal.
2. Copy the setup files to C:\i386 and run setup.exe to start the installation.

Regardless of the scenario, you can run the install from wherever you want. I used to copy the i386 directly to the machine and run from there, that way if the machine needed any files it would know where to get them.


Once you're done you can save the VHD and move it to wherever you want...

Sounds about what I thought I would have to do. Thanks.

 

[Demon10000]

You could possibly use nLite to compile a bootable CD, too. But you're probably missing some files. I don't recall exactly what files it looks for, but there is one file on the root of the CD that indicates the version of the disk. If you were to be able to get a hold of this file, then you could put that in a directory, and put i386 in there as well, then nLite would let you make a bootable disk from it.