Agile Aspect wrote:
Robert L Cochran wrote:
I now have a virtual machine that runs Windows XP, however I am in trouble with the Windows activation process because I can't (yet) provide a valid product key code to the Microsoft activation server. The installation CD is from Dell, I just bought a new laptop with a Dell "Windows XP downgrade" and I need to ask Dell's support people how I'm supposed to provide a valid product key for this. It may be that I have to install Windows Vista first (because I have a Vista CD and product key too) and then downgrade to XP, I don't know quite yet.
The valid product key for Windows on Dell laptops should be on bottom side of the computer.
Just as a thought, I have a laptop with "XP pro" and Fedora on the two partitions which came from the factory, and of course a grub setup to boot one or the other. Should you have a similar setup, you might find this interesting:
As root: # create a COW image of the whole hard drive qemu-img create -b /dev/sda -f qcow2 disk_bitimage # and boot it qemu-kvm -m 700 -hda disk_bitimage
Then boot Windows... Note that the changes are only in Linux, and I have not remotely summoned the courage to try booting linux under this thing.