Re: V Box

David Prentice writes:
> Now, what She'd really like would be her dual-boot XP desktop=20
> fully integrated into a VirtualBox session so She wouldn't=20
> need to reinstall anything, but thus far I've only been=20
> playing with VirtualBox for half a day and can't find a way=20
> to use an existing hard disk install of XP as the basis for a=20
> session and I'm not too experienced with virtual machines as=20
> computers are a hobby, not a vocation for me.=20

It's -possible- to do this.

There are a number of caveats currently that make it more=20
difficult than a walk in zero-gee, but it's not improbable
that you'll succeed.

There are a few threads that detail changes you'll need to make
to your installed XP system -- such as removing existing "motherboard"
devices and drivers, disabling MS's AGP driver, etc, and the fun
part, modeling the existing hard-drive.

best bet? make sure you have a _good_ backup, and lots of time
to do this.  And if you can, have a dedicated computer just for
performing the transition, because you'll want to be online during
the entire operation, and you will be rebooting.

This is a lot easier to perform using VMWare Workstation, but of course,
there's a price difference. 

http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Migrate_Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324764            # AGP driver
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=3D662018   # Raw Disk Access