Virtual Machine help please.

[Journey]

I am trying/wanting to create a vmx image of a previous OS install on a seperate hard disk to my current XP install. The image is of my old PC and I no longer have the machine in order to capture a live image of it only the physical hard drive.

1. Is this possible to do in my current XP install.
2. If 1. is true then what sofware do I need?
3. If this software is avilable, where from and how much does it cost.

Thanks in advance for all the help!

 

[Mattus]

One problem I can see is that if you do manage to copy the old drive onto a virtual HD, the XP installation won't boot. The virtual machine software will most likely expose a pretty generic set of hardware to the virtual OS (VMWare mimics a fairly dated Intel chipset, IIRC), and assuming that you didn't happen to have that hardware in your old system, it could be tricky to get anything other than a BSOD.

 

[this_is_gav]

VMWare have something along these lines. I think it's VMware Converter, and there used to be a free edition (might still be). Haven't used it, so can't guarantee it'll work at all, let alone do what you want, but give it a look.