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wililupy
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Is it possible to enable VT in a Virtual Machine?

Hello,

We are in the process of pushing out VDI to our users, however, we can't run all of our applications on our VD's.

We are currently using Desktop PC's that run Windows 7. We have an application that will only run under Windows XP Compatibility, which requires that the PC have VT enabled.

When I cloned one of the PC's and fired it up, everything worked but XP mode, which said that the host does not have VIrtual Technology enabled in the BOIS.

The BIOS on the host has it enabled and it works perfectly fine, but the BIOS on the VM does not even have the option. I have looked around at the the CPU settings and I have enabled Use Intel VT-x/AMD-V for instruction set virtualization and Intel EPT/AMD RVI for MMU Virtualization options on these desktops and they still can't run in XP Mode.

Anyone have any experience running this on ESX?

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vmroyale
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Hello.

Have you seen this?

Good Luck!

Brian Atkinson | vExpert | VMTN Moderator | Author of "VCP5-DCV VMware Certified Professional-Data Center Virtualization on vSphere 5.5 Study Guide: VCP-550" | @vmroyale | http://vmroyale.com

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Troy_Clavell
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no, VT cannot be enabled at the guest OS, it's not possible.

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vmroyale
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Hello.

Have you seen this?

Good Luck!

Brian Atkinson | vExpert | VMTN Moderator | Author of "VCP5-DCV VMware Certified Professional-Data Center Virtualization on vSphere 5.5 Study Guide: VCP-550" | @vmroyale | http://vmroyale.com
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admin
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If you download the update for Windows Virtual PC, you can run your XP mode VM without hardware-assisted virtualization, but it will be slow. Nested hypervisors do not perform very well.

wililupy
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That did it!

It is a little slower than I expected, but at least they can run this legacy peice of software until the developer gets out of the past and develops software for the new OS's.

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jbruelasdgo
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do you realize that XP compatibility mode is in fact a virtual machine "hidden" inside Windows 7?

would be Faster to virtualize XP and put the application there, and then give access to Windows 7 users to it

other solution would be to actually virtualize the app using ThinApp

Jose B Ruelas

Jose B Ruelas http://aservir.wordpress.com
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wililupy
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I thought about virtualizing it with Thin App, but the application is very dependent on being able to write to the Windows Directory, and it depends heavily on the c:\documents and settings\All Users\AppData\Local\Temp directory for storing temp files, which Windows 7 locks down even to local admins. We tried changing the Permissions and owners of those directories to the users of those PC's, but it still did not work.

The other problem we have with ThinApp is that the users workstation has to be enabled from the server that the software reports too, and with ThinApp, it looks like it is comming all from the same server which locks up all subsequent users.

We are currently running Windows XP VM's for many users, but management wants to move forward with Windows 7, and we want to see if the compatibility will work and get this app running properly under 7, and if so, we can move forward giving these users Windows 7 Machines, otherwise, we will have to have those users remain on XP while all other users are on Windows 7.

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TomHowarth
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XP Mode is basically a virtualized instance of XP running on the Win7 instance, VT Extensions is hardware virtualization from the Processor and cannot be passed through to a nested guest as VMware currently do not vitalize the hardware extensions, further they have to my knowledge no intention of doing so.

One possibility for your application that will only run is to try to run it under terminal services and deploy it to your guest. alternatively try App-V and try sequencing it on a XP machine

If you found this or any other answer useful please consider the use of the Helpful or correct buttons to award points

Tom Howarth VCP / vExpert

VMware Communities User Moderator

Blog: www.planetvm.net

Contributing author on "[VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment|http://www.amazon.co.uk/VMware-VSphere-Virtual-Infrastructure-Security/dp/0137158009/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256146240&sr=1-1]".

Tom Howarth VCP / VCAP / vExpert
VMware Communities User Moderator
Blog: http://www.planetvm.net
Contributing author on VMware vSphere and Virtual Infrastructure Security: Securing ESX and the Virtual Environment
Contributing author on VCP VMware Certified Professional on VSphere 4 Study Guide: Exam VCP-410
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