On 10/25/22 01:09, Samuel Sieb wrote:
On 10/25/22 00:27, ToddAndMargo via users wrote:
> On 10/24/22 22:08, Samuel Sieb wrote:
>> On 10/24/22 21:26, ToddAndMargo via users wrote:
>>> On 10/24/22 21:09, Slade Watkins via users wrote:
>>>> On 10/24/22 11:38 PM, ToddAndMargo via users wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Is there a way to tape a native Windows hard
>>>>> drive and port it to qemu-kvm?
>>>>
>>>> Hm. Did a bit of digging... this is all I could find.
>>>>
>>>>
https://manuel.kiessling.net/2013/03/19/converting-a-running-physical-mac...
>>>
>>> Yikes!
>>
>> Yes, that's pretty crazy, but that's doing the conversion live
>> without downtime and would have been somewhat easier with kpartx.
>> But it also doesn't apply to Windows.
>>
>> I assume that you can shut the system down because otherwise I don't
>> know how you would do it. The easiest way is just to make a raw disk
>> image from the source hard drive and boot that. You can save a lot
>> of space using a qcow image by using ntfsclone to copy the data since
>> that only copies the used sectors. Windows will probably be somewhat
>> unhappy about the hardware changing underneath, but should be able to
>> get over that.
>
> Would you have a link to a "how to"?
I don't. Can you move the windows hard drive to the VM system, maybe
using a USB enclosure? Or do you have enough space to copy the entire
drive to an image? What is your goal here?
A customer approached me about a specialty application
(aircraft transponder tracking) that needs Linux. But
wanted to put it on an old computer with windows on
it. He asked if you could dual boot. I said yes,
but it is froth with issues.
So I was thinking of porting his Windows to qemu-kvm
if he really wanted Windows. But better yet, just
put in new hard drive and pack up his old drive in
a static bag for safe keeping. He has several
computers, so he can run his windows stuff of
various other computers.