[GRLUG] VirtualBox question

[John-Thomas Richards]

On Fri, Feb 27, 2009 at 12:05:34PM -0500, Bill Littlejohn wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 27, 2009 at 11:40 AM, John-Thomas Richards <jtr at jrichards.org>wrote:
> > I'm confused about why I need to move the partition into another
> > partition (on a USB drive).  Is it so it has a bootloader?  Can I not
> > install a bootloader into the restore partition and accomplish the same
> > thing?  (Perhaps my ignorance is showing here...)  The restore partition
> > would only be used to install the VM and then it could be removed (at
> > the least unmounted).
> >
> > > If you have a spare drive large enough to copy your existing drive into,
> > > then you can attach that to the VM and boot the VM using a live CD ISO,
> > > repartition the drive to turn sda2,sda3,sda4 into one ntfs partition,
> > reboot
> > > the VM without the live cd and run the restore, then when it's all done
> > and
> > > youv'e successfully booted the restored OS, shrink the OS partition as
> > small
> > > as practical (and obviously somewhat <38GB).
> > > After all that you'll have a working VM, and all you have to do is
> > convert
> > > the physical drive into a virtual one and change the VM config to use the
> > > new virtual disk.
> > > I may be wrong, but other methods seems to get rather complicated rather
> > > quickly.
> > > This of course all hinges on having another 130GB+ drive laying around.
> >
> > Why would I repartition sda2-4 into one ntfs partition?  I don't want to
> > get rid of my Linux install.  I just want to boot the restore partition
> > via VirtualBox to create a VM of the factory install of my laptop, after
> > which I can delete the restore partition and continue running Debian as
> > my operating system, booting <gulp> the Vista VM as needed.
> > --
> > john-thomas
> 
> Apologies for being unclear.

I'm pretty sure it's not you being unclear.

> I essentially meant to make a copy of your existing disk, and then to modify
> those partitions. In the end having a single (restored) OS in a VM, no
> dual-boot.

I'm still confused why I would modify the partitions on my drive.  Do you
mean the USB drive?

> I also did not mean to confuse the issue by sending something mildly
> related, that was only to provide that Virtualbox can boot a partition and
> some associated commands that may help shed some light.
> 
> I'm installing V.B. on another pc right, and I'll be back shortly.

I think I need to reread this thread.  Thanks for your help!
-- 
john-thomas
------
Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.
Henry David Thoreau, naturalist and author (1817-1862)