Dual boot XP and Kubuntu?

[dibl]

In my usual learning style, I first learned two wrong ways to install this Win 8 evaluation copy, but on the third try I got it. For installation on a working Win 7 VM, you need to keep VMware Tools, and you need to choose the "Keep my settings and apps" route for installation. But I had to uninstall all other software, and delete everything in My Docs and Pix and Music and so forth -- basically stripped out everything from Win 7 except VMware Tools, in order to free up more than 16GB of space on my 40GB virtual disk. But it's working now, on a Dell Latitude E6500 -- I must say it doesn't look bad, although the navigation is rather non-obvious, IMO.

Thanks Steve!

[SteveRiley]

Well, to get around the virtual disk size, you could always exand it, presuming you have enough physical space to accomodate that.

And I don't know of a single rational person on the planet who likes WGA.

[dibl]

The problem with the .exe installer was a PEBKAC situation -- it worked correctly when the user pulled his head out of ....

However, I hit the wall when it informed me that it requires 16GB of free space on the C: drive, which in my case is a 40GB virtual disk that has 28GB of Win 7 on it. So .... hmmm. I don't know whether I can rip out enough stuff to get down to 24GB or not.

Also, somehow the Win 8 installer triggered a WGA event which informed me that different hardware was detected and I have 3 days to re-register Win 7 -- a reminder of why I made the change in 2006, and how pleasant and trouble-free life has been since I took the decision to make Gnu/Linux my OS of choice.

[dibl]

Cool -- thanks Steve.

FYI, the .exe version has bombed here -- "blah blah blah is not a valid Win32 application" error, on a Win 7 VM.

I'm going to try the ISO.

[SteveRiley]

Wow. I hadn't looked at the FAQ -- thanks for spotting that.

A downloadable ISO is available, but it operates in the same way: installs over an existing Windows Vista or 7, with no way to go back.

So, boys and girls, if you want to play, do it in a Windows 7 VM that you can convert to 8 and then just delete when you're finished.

[dibl]

Ummm ....

CAUTION! That download link leads to a downloaded file named "Windows8-ConsumerPreview-setup.exe" which, as I understand the warning, is designed to be run on some prior version of Windows, and convert it permanently to Win 8. It says this:

Important: If you decide to go back to your previous operating system, you'll need to reinstall it from the recovery or installation media that came with your PC, which is typically DVD media. If you don’t have recovery media, you might be able to create it from a recovery partition on your PC using software provided by your PC manufacturer. Check the support section of your PC manufacturer’s website for more information. After you install Windows 8, you won’t be able to use the recovery partition on your PC to go back to your previous version of Windows.

So, plan your strategy before you launch that thing -- use your spare Windows, not one that you actually need to use in the future. I guess they're not going to let us have an ISO, like they did for Win 7.

[SteveRiley]

Where'd you get Win8 at? Please tell me. I am really looking for it.

Windows 8 Consumer Preview

Win8

P.S. -- I am also going to try importing my Win8 guest OS as well as my XP guest OS. And, since this box is dual booted with Win7 I may try to import my physical win7 installation into VMware as a guest OS. Wouldn't that be the cat's meow! Running XP, Win7 and Win8 apps from the Linux desktop simultaneously!

Where'd you get Win8 at? Please tell me. I am really looking for it.

[SteveRiley]

When I was running VirtualBox, DKMS was indeed installed. And after each kernel upgrade, DKMS would do its thing, and automatically recompile all necessary modules. Very nice. I like automation

However, after I switched to VMware Player and purged VirtualBox, apt-get autoremove wiped out DKMS, which indicates that VMware is not compiled to use it. It's only a minor inconvenience, true. But it is curious to note that Oracle's support for Linux plumbing (DKMS, VM settings, storage drivers that are aware of SSDs, and such) exceeds that of VMware, but it falls short of VMware for integration with Linux desktops.

[GreyGeek]

.....
I would expect the same result on Kubuntu.
....

I am running the dkms modules, which were installed by VB when I first installed it on this Precise installation. Since then, no kernel update has triggered a recompile of VB. When I upgraded VB that did trigger a recompile. Yesterday's kernel upgrade did not trigger a recompile.

[dibl]

This is a Debian system, however FYI:

root@imerabox:/home/don# apt-cache policy dkms
dkms:
  Installed: 2.2.0.3-1
  Candidate: 2.2.0.3-1
  Version table:
 *** 2.2.0.3-1 0
        500 http://cdn.debian.net/debian/ sid/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

I would expect the same result on Kubuntu.

DKMS: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic...Module_Support

Probably a better computer engineer than me could figure out how to implement module-assistant to build the VMware kernel modules for new kernels. I have module-assistant installed and it does automatically build my Nvidia driver module for each new kernel. Hmmmm, let's see if I can figure it out by comparison .....

EDIT: It works for Nvidia because Debian provides the nvidia-kernel-source package. No such package for VMware -- would have to do that work first before module-assistant's automated build feature could be implemented. Sigh.

[SecretCode]

Do you have dkms installed? That's supposed to avoid the situation the dibl describes (although iirc it didn't help as much with vmware as it does with nvidia and virtualbox, the other modules I have that seem to benefit from it).

[dibl]

Is this expected behavior for VMware Player?

Yes. Same as other proprietary packages that address your hardware directly (e.g. video drivers), the applicable kernel modules must be compiled against the booted kernel. So new kernel = new module compilation. For this reason, if your Linux distribution does not automatically install the kernel-headers and build-essential packages, you need to install them before trying to run VMware or after a new kernel is installed and booted.

This is the process that fails when VMware's design falls behind Linux kernel development too far -- that's why we need the patches referenced above.

[SecretCode]

When I last used vmware it needed recompiling under all sorts of conditions. I would say that's normal.

[SteveRiley]

Today's Precise kernel upgrade mildly borked VMware Player. When I rebooted, I noticed that several of the player's drivers failed to load. When I executed vmplayer in a console, a dialog box informed me that it was time to recompile those modules. After that, the player runs fine again.

Is this expected behavior for VMware Player? Not that I mind, just curious whether I've uncovered anything unusual.