Situation:
I have Windows 7 installed already on the system, but I want to run another copy on a separate partition. Only issue with that is that my Laptop is an HP, and as such has lots of HP stuff on it, including many partitions. Partitions are: Recovery, Normal C Drive, System something and HP Tools (drivers I think?). This means I have 4 partitions on Disk 0, and cannot add another partition while keeping the disk bootable, so I assumed VHD would be the way to go.
What I've done:
Created a fixed size, 150GB VHD stored in the main C:\ folder, named win7.vhd (C:\win7.vhd)
Booted to Windows 7 Installer from USB because I didn't have any spare DVDs to burn another copy after I lost the last one in the move.
Installer runs along, sometimes hits the issue with drivers but sometimes doesnt, bit of a hit and miss. But usually it gets to the screen where I can select a disk, and it lists the 4 partitions on disk 0.
At this point, I press shift + F10 and bring up command prompt, type DISKPART, that runs fine, then I type: "select vdisk file=c:\win7.vhd" and hit enter. The installer says "DiskPart has encountered an error: The system cannot find the file specified. See the System Event Log for more information. There is no virtual disk selected." and goes no further.
I have succussfully attached the VHD fine in the existing windows OS, and am able to access it perfectly fine, but I cannot run the installer from inside windows and install to that because it says something like my computer may not be compatible with VHD boot or something so doesnt go past the select disk screen.
Can anyone shed some light as to what I could do in this situation? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Cheers,
Sam.
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