Turn Physical to Virtual and Install New Physical?

[JtNavia]

Is it possible to turn my current physical machine to a virtual machine and install a new os as the physical machine? I want to primarily use the physical machine for a specific task without performance degradation and use the virtual machine for backup and other tasks.

[AndreTheGiant]

You can try to use VMware Converter to convert your physical machine in a virtual one.

But you need a server, a workstation, a machine to play it (and a virtualization software also).

When your VM is working, you can reinstall your old machine as you need.

Andre

[Dave_Mishchenko]

What are you running on the physical host? http://sanbarrow has a good tool (MOA) that will allow you to cold clone the host.

[JtNavia]

I am running Windows XP. I would like to turn this installation to a virtual one in order to save my programs and still be able to use them and reinstall the physical installation with a stripped down XP. I want to use the physical host just for audio recording without using VMware so I have the best performance, and use the virtual machine for casual tasks like internet, e-mail, etc... is that possible?

[continuum]

Audio recording ? - something like Cubase maybe ?

I would not install Cubase on a hoost that also has VMware installed.

Why not use dualboot ?

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VMX-parameters- VMware-liveCD - VM-Sickbay

[JtNavia]

I need as much space as possible for audio recording and I do not want to end up using a partition that is too small or too large. I also want to be able to not reboot just to use the internet and reboot again to record. If I close VMware while I am recording, I would not experience a performance decrease. Am I correct?

[continuum]

Hmm - VMware installs several services that are active all the time - if you disable them and start them manually whenever you want to run VMware this should work.

personally I would not do it though ... I had bad experience with VMware + Cubase on the same system

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VMX-parameters- VMware-liveCD - VM-Sickbay

[JtNavia]

I am using Sonar, but were you using Cubase in a virtual machine or on the host machine?

[continuum · Accepted solution]

Cubase in a VM ? - no thanks that doesn't make it.

Cubase on a host that also has Workstation installed ? - if I can avoid it I will not do it.

For Cubase I prefer dualboot - it works best on a very clean XP-install with minimal network installed

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VMX-parameters- VMware-liveCD - VM-Sickbay

[JtNavia]

Thank you. Exactly what problems did you have with Cubase when you had a workstation installed on the same host?