It's NOT Starting the virtual machine...

[Slimbone]

Yesterday, I had another one of those infamous random kernel power reboots. Unfortunately, it happened while I had Virtual XP running. Since then, whenever I try to start XP Mode, the "Starting the virtual machine..." window never goes away. The Status bar makes it about 1/3 of the way, then restarts. This happens again and again, and never brings up XP.

If there isn't an easy fix for this, that's okay. I only have two programs on there, and starting over from scratch would be fairly painless. In the Programs and Features uninstall option, all I see is Windows XP Mode... I don't see Windows Virtual PC listed. Is there anything I need to look out for when uninstalling?

 

[Zidane24]

Yesterday, I had another one of those infamous random kernel power reboots. Unfortunately, it happened while I had Virtual XP running. Since then, whenever I try to start XP Mode, the "Starting the virtual machine..." window never goes away. The Status bar makes it about 1/3 of the way, then restarts. This happens again and again, and never brings up XP.

If there isn't an easy fix for this, that's okay. I only have two programs on there, and starting over from scratch would be fairly painless. In the Programs and Features uninstall option, all I see is Windows XP Mode... I don't see Windows Virtual PC listed. Is there anything I need to look out for when uninstalling?

Uninstalling XP Mode and reinstalling will probably be your best bet

Just uninstall it from Add/Remove and you will be fine

 

[madtownidiot]

If the virtual HD hasn't been corrupted because of the power failure, the above suggestion should work.. however you may have a bigger problem with an inadequate power supply.. based on the hardware in your specs, I wouldn't use anything with less than a 60A 12v rail for running games or virtual machines.. simply because running a VM will max out the power consumption on your entire system for extended periods. That may be the cause of your problems

 

[Slimbone]

...based on the hardware in your specs, I wouldn't use anything with less than a 60A 12v rail for running games or virtual machines.. simply because running a VM will max out the power consumption on your entire system for extended periods.

Maybe I need to learn a thing or two about power supplies. I've been focused primarily on the wattage, and mine is a 750W Antec. If I'm looking at my specs right, my power supply is only 25A.

 

[Slimbone]

If anyone can post a link to a power supply that is within the specs madtownidiot recommends, I'd appreciate it.

 

[Lemur]

I wonder if a system restore would bring it back? I always clone my virtual drives.

Madtownidiot is spot on with your bigger problem.

Newegg.com - CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Compatible with Core i7 Power Supply

 

[madtownidiot]

Here... one with a bit of leeway for a couple years down the road, mainly because computers tend to draw more power as they get older, even if you don't add anything to them. I made the mistake of going with a recommendation lower than what I initially planned with the system in my build and fried my PSU when I started overclocking my system.. You might even want to look at something in the 1000w range.. just in case you decide to upgrade your graphics card sometime in the next couple years.. or go with dual graphics cards

 

[Slimbone]

So, I'm assuming this should be adequate?
Amazon.com: Corsair CMPSU-850TX 850-Watt TX Series 80 Plus Certified Power Supply compatible with Intel Core i7 and Core i5: Electronics

And for the record, I'm not a gamer... although, I do play solitaire every couple of months.

 

[madtownidiot]

So, I'm assuming this should be adequate?
Amazon.com: Corsair CMPSU-850TX 850-Watt TX Series 80 Plus Certified Power Supply compatible with Intel Core i7 and Core i5: Electronics

And for the record, I'm not a gamer... although, I do play solitaire every couple of months.

Looks like a good one.. But I don't think there's anything wrong with being a gamer at any age.. I built my machine primarily for running multiple VMs in order to provide remote desktop assistance, but it also makes a h*ll of a good gaming system.. and it doesn't hurt to have an idea of what what's going on with current games when part of my business is building custom systems

 

[zzz2496]

I think I know what happen... The memory file is somehow corrupted, go to "C:\Users\[your_user_name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Virtual Machines" (or any other path where you placed your VM), see if you can find a .vsv (Virtual machine Saved State) file. If you do find it, delete it. Once it's deleted your virtual machine will "restart" as if it was turned off.

zzz2496

Edit: do shut the VM down prior deleting the file...

 

[Slimbone]

But I don't think there's anything wrong with being a gamer at any age...

Oh, I'm not dissing gaming. I'm just not into it, that's all.

I think I know what happen... The memory file is somehow corrupted, go to "C:\Users\[your_user_name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Virtual Machines" (or any other path where you placed your VM), see if you can find a .vsv (Virtual machine Saved State) file. If you do find it, delete it. Once it's deleted your virtual machine will "restart" as if it was turned off.

zzz2496

Edit: do shut the VM down prior deleting the file...

Thanks, zzz2496. I'll try that tonight.

 

[LooseCannon]

Thread revive! My issue wasn't caused by a power failure, but by the virtual machine haning when restarting it for a software installation. I had to kill it,,, well, didn't have to, but I ran out of patience.

My virtual machine then didn't boot. After timing out (didn't record the time taken), it errored refering to 'integration features'.

I disabled integration features (no note thereon here), but that only got the machine into a cmd type window, which seemed to have no functionality. The virtual machine would then only go into hibernation, not shut down.

Resolution [same as zzz2496 above]: delete(or move away) the virtual machines '.vsv' file in %drive%:\Users\%yourUserName%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Virtual Machines. That's where mine was anyrate.

The vsv is a 'sleep' cache?

Note that I couldn't powerdown the virtual machine as zzz2496 suggested, because it would only hibernate. So that file was deleted while the machine was 'hibernating'.

The virtual machine booted successfully after the deletion. I've not checked what happened to the installation that prompted the failed restart, because it's only a test machine and not critical or used much. However, the 'fix' worked and the machine reboots and seems to operate normally.

I attempted to re-create the problem so I could get screen shots. But after copying the corrupted 'vsv' file back (I'd not deleted it, just moved it out of the way), the virtual machine still booted fully. That suggests the 'vsv' by itself wasn't the issue? The fix nevertheless worked for me.

 

[Kari]

The .vsv file is like the hiberfile.sys in a real computer, it contains the hibernation data. It only exists when a Virtual PC virtual machine is running or hibernated, being automatically deleted every time the vm is shut down.

Deleting .vsv file manually causes a vm to reboot because it can no longer find hibernation data. If the hibernation caused some relaunch issues, I would not restore the .vsv file to its original location. Instead, shut the vm down once which causes .vsv being deleted and a new one created when vm is launched next time.

A list of different XP Mode files and their descriptions can be found in the beginning of this tutorial: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/21904-virtual-xp-machine-copy.html

Kari

 

[LooseCannon]

Thanks Kari. Well worth the reference.

However, this thread is about a VM not starting, as mine wouldn't. Also, mine would not shut down, so the vsv file would not go away by itself.

And I only 'restored' the vsv file to try to get better details for this thread. I'd not recommend doing it in the real worl either. I guess others might misinterpret my post, so your clarification is well placed.

 

[Kari]

If you can not start the XP Mode (or any other Virtual PC vm) after first closing it, then deleting the .vsv file and finally relaunching it, the best alternative is to move the original vhd to a safe location, reinstall XP mode and attach the original vhd as hard disk 2 to be able to recover personal files and folders.

Kari

 

[hershmab]

It's STILL not Starting - the virtual machine...

I have had the same problem running Windows Virtual XP under W7-Pro x64. I found that I did have a .VSV file and deleted it as suggested by zzz2496.

When I tried restarting VXP, I still had exactly the same symptoms as Slimbone reported back in October.

Is there anything I should try before reinstalling?