Windows NT 4 & Virtualbox

What is the VM hardware version you are using for the converted VM? The SCSI controller for the converted VM would have an older Bus Logic SCSI adapter in case its version 3 or 4 and latest LSI Logic adapter in case of versions 7,8 or 9.

Newer versions of Converter don't do much with Windows 2000 or prior.

Open VMware Workstation and make your NT4 workstation current (but do not start it).  Then in the VMware Menu, VM, Manage, Change Hardware Compatibility.

What level of VMware hardware is it now?  And can you change it to a different level (say earlier) to see if that helps.

.... Thinkpads_User

This looks like thw wrong storage controller, has been selected on in use.

You may also want to look at my FAQ, here

HOW TO: FAQ VMware P2V Troubleshooting

and use Ultimate P2V to convert your Windows NT 4.0 Server, if Converter does not help.

When you import a WinNT server you need to use the buslogic SCSI controller as this is natively supported by the OS..
I must say it was something of an art importing some of these systems years ago..
You may at this point be able to simply change the controller type in virtual hardware or you may need to reimport..

I can't recall ever importing with the disks as IDE on WinNT but it's likely changing the controller will then identify the disks as SCSI rather than IDE..

I should add.
Another trick which was commonly used in the early days of virtualisation was to actually add a supported physical controller to the hardware before importing.
In my case I bought a LSI SCSI controller which we would install into the server, load the drivers, then shutdown and cold clone or Ghost the server.
Which LSI SCSI controller,? I think it was a LSI 20320 PCI. this uses the same driver as the vmware LSI paralell SCSI controller..
 But in your case just use the buslogic.

Hi,
Thanks for all your answers and we have tried all but still getting...

When the VM is created as IDE or SATA controller it loads up to a point and then gets stuck on blue screen STOP: 0x0000007B INNACESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE and loads of text about .sys files.

If we change the controller to SCSI or SAS it just gives us a black screen "Missing Operating System" We've tried switch on/off IO APIC and Enable VT-x/AMD-v also switched between lsilogic and buslogic Always getting the same results.

We used the version 3 VMware converter as this was compatible with NT

It is annoying as we can successfully run it on vmware workstation which works flawlessly but we want to migrate it to Virtualbox.

Anymore hints would be appreciated

Thanks

Did you check after conversion, it has an Active Boot Partition? (when the controller is SCSI).

Try an Ultimate P2V
http://searchvmware.techtarget.com/tip/Ultimate-P2V

Hi,
I will try Ultimate P2V

The thing I don't understand is that the VM boot perfectly well in VMware Workstation but not when converted to a virtual box vdi??

Thanks

The Virtualbox virtual machine hardware is different. VMware Converter is designed to create VMs for VMware hardware.

Why do you want to migrate to Virtualbox, if you have running on Workstation?

Also VMware Workstation is a top notch product and another reason to stay with it.

.... Thinkpads_User

WinNT does not support SATA natively which may be the cause of the blue screen.
Another method I have used to convert between hypervisors is to export to an ovf or ova and reimport to the other product.
Maybe VirtualBox is more the issue..It's not great where as VMWare workstation is an excellent product (for a desktop product)

Check if PlateSpin Migrate can help you with the migration as I have found it to be used in specific cases when vConverter isn't helpful.

could you clone copy the data from existing virtual disk to new virtualbox disk.

e.g. present the P2Ved disk, to a Virtualbox Helper machine, and then copy the data from P2Ved disk to new disk (created in virtualbox).

But if the issue is inherit with the NT Boot Loader, this suggests it's too old and not compatible with the disk storage system?

The NT 4 server is up and running but I have a strange thing in that I have loaded the AMD PC Family NIC card drivers and the server gets an IP from the DHCP on the router and it can ping itself but that is all. Can't see or ping anything else on the network not even the router. I have limited experience with NT Server but I know networks and this is very strange.

Thanks

Have you defined a Default Gateway ?

Yes - I have attached the result of the ipconfig
ipconfig.JPG

it's interesting because the MAC Address, does not look like a VMware MAC address, which should start with 00:50:56:xx:xx:xx.

traffic may not leave the ESXi server?

can you check VMware Network Interface settings outside the VM, Right Click Edit Settings?

Because this is how I got the system up and running in VirtualBox