Track configuration of Joe's "Perspectives" laptop.

[frenchjam]

From @frenchjam on December 10, 2015 14:6

This thread will be used to record operations carried out on the Perspectives laptop so as to document the required development and runtime configurations.

You can also find here how I generated the various virtual machines (VMs) that I use under Parallels on my Mac. The configuration of the VMs will be tracked, however, in separate issues. Here we track only what we do on the Perspectives laptop itself.

Copied from original issue: frenchjam/GRASP-ISS#1

[frenchjam]

Prérequis pour utilisation Oculus DK2 sur HP Zbook15.pdf Virtual-IT, contractor to CADMOS for other VR experiments, has researched the question of using the Oculus with the ISS station laptop. The attached file gives their recommendations.

[frenchjam]

Need to quickly (by end of December) identify which software components, if any, need to be installed on the laptop to allow the GRASP software to run. Examples would be .NET framework, VC2015 runtime, etc.

[frenchjam]

Started up Windows for the first time and did the minimal configuration. Created a User named Joe with password 'cadmos'.

[frenchjam]

When logging on there was a message about protecting the machine with HP Client Security. I think that the first time I logged in I enabled it, but today when I logged in the first time it asked me if I wanted to let HP Security Client make modifications and I said 'no'. There is an icon for HP Client Security in the hidden icons section but I don't know what is running in the background. I decided to leave it alone until I know more about it.

[frenchjam]

There are 2 'important' and 3 total messages in the Action Center notification area:

1. Click to see antispyware programs (Important)
2. Update Microsoft Security Essentials (Important)
3. Set up backup

I am keeping the machine isolated from the network for the moment, so I am not going to do the updates just yet.

[frenchjam]

I want to create a clone of the virgin operating system so that I can do development on my Mac (using Parallels) and so that I can work against a 'fresh' system later on. To start, I followed the instruction at http://kb.parallels.com/115815 to see if the system is compatible with Parallels. I found in the log that the machine uses BIOS so it should be OK.

[frenchjam]

I changed the TCP configuration on the local network adapter to give a fixed address: 192.168.200.166 with subnet mask 255.255.255.0. I will use this to connect directly to my Mac at address 192.168.200.26.

[frenchjam]

Downloaded Parallels Transporter and copied to USB Key. Started WindowsXP and ran a Avast! virus scan on the USB key. No viruses found.

[frenchjam]

Installed Parallels Transporter Agent on DATADRIVE1. Disabled the Windows Firewall per instructions for migration using Parallels Transporter Agent.

[frenchjam]

Executed Parallels Transporter Agent on the Perspectives PC and used Parallels Desktop on the Mac to create a virtual machine copy of the Perspectives Windows 7 system, entitled "Perspectives Virgin". NB Copied on the Windows (C:) and HP_RECOVERY (D:) drives. Parallels Deskstop automatically booted the new virtual machine. Windows 7 appears to have started up correctly. There was some message from the HP Hardware about a faulty connection, probably due to the lack of a internet interface of some sort. I closed the alert messages and shut down the virtual machine.

[frenchjam]

Created a copy of the "Perspectives Virgin" virtual machine on the WD Element external disk and called it "Perspectives Working Copy". I started up this virtual machine inside Parallels Desktop. I received a message about a duplicate MAC address and responded that it should create a new one. I also received a message about not disconnecting the external HD while the virtual machine is running. The virtual machine seems to be running correctly.

[frenchjam]

Updated Microsoft Security Essentials on the "Perspectives Working Copy" virtual machine.

[frenchjam]

Disabled Microsoft SpyNet in Microsoft Security Essentials.

[frenchjam]

Ran "Windows Update", which first updated itself. Then it relaunched, but seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to search for new updates. I found messages in the background about an error signaled by HP Connection Manager. I closed the error message windows. Windows became very sluggish. I shut it down.

[frenchjam]

Windows is taking a long time to shut down.

[frenchjam]

Renamed virtual machine to "Perspectives Baseline".

[frenchjam]

Copied "Perspectives Baseline.pvm" to the Mac internal hard drive. Renamed the copy on the external drive to "Perspectives Baseline alpha". Opened the copy on the internal drive. Received a message about a duplicate MAC address. Created a new one and then renamed the virtual machine to "Perspectives Baseline beta".

[frenchjam]

Will track changes to "Perspectives Baseline beta" in a separate issue and will pick up here if we have to backtrack to "Perspectives Baseline alpha".

[frenchjam]

I am going to clone the Windows disk (c:) on the Perspectives laptop using Clonezilla. To do so I create a bootable USB pen drive with Clonezilla installed following instructions at http://tuxboot.org/.

[frenchjam]

The Perspectives laptop appears to have 3 main installed HDs:

Windows (C:) 219 GB DATADRIVE0 (E:) 931 GB DATADRIVE1 (F:) 931 GM

Plut two other partitions:

HP_RECOVERY (D:) 15.5 GB HP_TOOLS (G:) 1.99 GB

This info is useful when trying to close the Windows drive using Clonezilla.

[frenchjam]

Creating Clone using Clonezilla.

Choices for destination partition include:

sda1 931.5G_ntfs_DATADRIVE0 sdb1 931.5G_ntfs_DATADRIVE1 sdc1 1G_ntfs_SYSTEM sdc2 219.9G_ftfs_Windows sdc3 15.6G_ntfs_HP_RECOVERY sdc4 2G_vfat_HP_TOOLS

Using "sda1 931.5G_ntfs_DATADRIVE0" for the place to save the image.

Image name is set to 2016-01-30-15-img_HPWindowsAlmostVirgin

Choices for source partitions:

sdb1 931.5G_ntfs_DATADRIVE1 sdc1 1G_ntfs_SYSTEM sdc2 219.9G_ftfs_Windows sdc3 15.6G_ntfs_HP_RECOVERY sdc4 2G_vfat_HP_TOOLS

I choose sdc2.

Choose "Skip checking ..." Choose "Yes, check the saved image." Choose "Not to encrypt the image."

Command line is reported to be:

/urs/sbin/ocs-sr -q2 -c -j2 -z1p -i 4096 -p true saveparts 2016-01-30-15-img_HPWindowsAlmostVirgin sdc2

Perhaps the above could be entered directly on the command line, with an appropriately modified image file name.

After 2 hours it is only at 30% and the data rate keeps going down. I typed to stop and will try again.

[frenchjam]

Tried the above sequence a second time. Transfer rate started high but drop rapidly. I decided to stop after 5 minutes.

[frenchjam]

Tuxboot has multiple versions. The text on the download page says that 0.6 is the most recent version, but there are multiple 0.8 versions.

Reran tuxboot on the USB pen drive using version 0.8.3 (I don't remember if I used 0.6 or 0.8 before). Repeated the operations from above with this new installation on the pendrive. Clonezilla has gotten much farther than before (currently at 50%) in much less time.

[frenchjam]

Now going painfully slow around 62.32%.

[frenchjam]

Stopped it at 90.99% for Data Block Process and 40.22 for Total Block Process. Not worth the wait.

[frenchjam]

Trying to create a Clonezilla USB Pen Drive by an alternate method:

Download the Clonezilla Live zip file. If you already have a partition of at least 200 MB in size on your USB flash drive formatted with a FAT file system then skip to the next step (3). Otherwise create at least a 200 MB partition on your USB flash drive and format it with a FAT16 or FAT32 file system. Extract all the contents of the zip file to FAT16/FAT32 partition on your USB flash drive. Keep the directory architecture, for example, file "GPL" should be in the USB flash drive's top directory (e.g. G:\GPL). Browse to your USB flash drive and as an administrator, click the makeboot.bat in the dir utils\win32\ (for 32-bit Windows) or makeboot64.bat in the dir utils\win64\ (for 64-bit Windows). WARNING! Makeboot.bat must be run from your USB flash drive. Follow the on-screen instructions.

Downloaded the Clonezilla build 20151012-wily AMD64 and extracted on my Mac. Reformatted the pendrive under Windows XP. Booted the Windows 7 Perspectives Development VM and attempted to execute the makeboot64.bat but got an "unsupported media" message. Tried makeboot32.bat, but got the same message. Tried to boot off of the USB pen drive anyway on the Perspectives HP Laptop but it was not bootable.

[frenchjam]

I reconnected the pen drive to my Mac and said that it should be connected to the Parallels VM. This time it asked me to confirm that it should be disconnected from the Mac OS. I said yes. Then under Windows I navigated to the utils\win64\ directory on the pen drive and executed makeboot64.bat. This time it appeared to work.

[frenchjam]

I booted the Perspectives laptop using the newly bootable USB pen drive and created a clone of partition "sdc2 219.9G_ftfs_Windows" into the file "2016-01-30-21-img_HPWindowsAlmostVirgin" on "sdb1 931.5G_ntfs_DATADRIVE1" using the steps described above. The process worked much faster and completed successfully.

[frenchjam]

I was planning to clone the Windows image created above to DATADRIVE0, but I found that DATADRIVE0 has a pagefile.sys hidden file on it that is perhaps linked to the OS running from the main Windows disk. So I decided that I would trying cloning Windows to DATADRIVE1 instead. In preparation for this I copied 2016-01-30-21-img_HPWindowsAlmostVirgin to DATADRIVE0 and also to my Elements external HD. I also deinstalled Parallels Transport Agent which was installed on DATADRIVE1.

[frenchjam]

I used Clonizilla to recreate "2016-01-30-21-img_HPWindowsAlmostVirgin" on what was formerly DATADRIVE1. When executing the restore in Clonezilla there were a number of warnings about things not existing, etc. I said OK in each case. I was then able to boot the machine using, I believe, the Windows image on the new disk. There are two icons on the desktop that appear to be 'broken', probably due to the fact that Parallels Transport Agent is no longer there. I note that there are now two drives with the name "Windows" (c: and f:). I believe that I booted on f:, but I need to check that this is really the case.

[frenchjam]

I rebooted the Perspectives laptop, allowing it to boot to the default drive. But I can't tell if it is c: or f:. In any case, I created a restore point and then proceeded to try Windows Update. First, I connected to my home router using an ethernet cable. I had to change the IP configuration to get it to automatically set an IP address. I had set a fixed address in order to run Parallels Transport Agent to create a VM on my Mac. Then I launched Windows Update. It is updating Windows Update first and then will look for updates.

[frenchjam]

Windows Update appeared to fail on the laptop. I then played around with booting off of the f: partition. But it seems to always boot off of the c: partition even when I select a different drive in the HP startup menu. I changed the background on the desk top and always get the same one. I formatted the f: drive, then tried to boot off of it and the machine booted nevertheless, presumably off of the c: drive. Configuring to boot off of another drive will have to be investigated.

[frenchjam]

I went to shut down the laptop. I was informed that there are 141 updates that have been downloaded and will be installed. It is installing them now.

[frenchjam]

The updates were successfully installed. Then there were more. Microsoft Security Essentials gets installed as one of the updates and pops up a wizard under the other Update progress screen, which is confusing. But as near as I can tell, Windows 7 on my Perspectives laptop is now up to date.

[frenchjam]

Created a "System Image" on DATADISK1 using the Windows Backup Control Panel.

[frenchjam]

Created a Restore Point entitled "After the Windows Update malarky".

[frenchjam]

Used Clonezilla on the USB key to create a clone entitled "2016-01-31-18-img_HPWindowsUpdatedVirgin" on DATADISK0.

[frenchjam]

Rebooted Windows a number of times. Used Windows Update to check for latest updates and installed one, resulting in an automatic Restore Point.

[frenchjam]

Created a "System Image" on DATADISK0 using the Windows Backup Control Panel.

[frenchjam]

I foolishly connected my Apple Display to the Thunderbolt port on the Perspectives Laptop. This proceeded to load some drivers that I may or may not wish to have. I said 'no' when it requested permission to authorize some stuff, but I cannot guarantee that nothing was modified on the system because of the display having been connected.

[frenchjam]

Installed several important and recommended updates.

[frenchjam]

Installed Parallels Transport Agent on DATADRIVE0: and used it to make a new Virtual Machine on my Mac.

[frenchjam]

I tried again to boot off of the alternate disk by choosing it in the startup menu, but failed. I tried removing the primary disk from the boot option menu in the BIOS. It failed to boot off of either remaining disk. Then I remembered that I probably had given up on the ghost copy of Windows that I had installed on the alternate disk. I restored the primary disk to the boot options.

[frenchjam]

I tried to run Norton Ghost Version 2003 off of Julius' DVD drive. It gave an initial error message then got stuck scanning for USB devices. Since version 2003 is perhaps 32 bit only, I am not going to try any further.

[frenchjam]

I am using the DVD provided with the computer to install Windows 7 on an alternate disk (DATADRIVE1). I had to increase the delays in the startup menus in order to get the system to see the DVD drive soon enough to include it in the boot list.

[frenchjam]

Used bcdedit to change the name of the OS to "Perspectives Developement"

[frenchjam]

Tracking of the configuration of the Perspectives Development boot disk will be carried out in #10.

[frenchjam]

Installed Norton Ghost trial version on DATADRIVE0 in hopes of making a ghost copy of the main disk. It appears that the disk copy functionality is not included in the trial. I wanted to purchase, but Ghost doest not appear to be available for sale on the Norton website.

[frenchjam]

I tried to use my Clonezilla pendrive to copy the image to DATADRIVE1 but the pendrive would not boot. I booted from the main disk, then under Windows I navigated to the utils\win64\ directory on the pen drive and executed makeboot64.bat. I was subsequently able to boot FIlezilla from the pendrive.

[frenchjam]

I tried in vain to make DATADRIVE1 bootable with a version of Windows 7 that includes the necessary drivers for the ethernet, card reader, video card, etc. but to no avail. The disk delivered with the laptop says that it can be used to restore a system with all the necessary drivers preinstalled but that does not seem to be the case. I get a generic Windows 7 that boots, but that is without any drivers at all. I tried installing the Filezilla clone after having installed the generic Windows 7 but that did not work. I tried hiding the main disk and restoring from a System Image, but that does not work either. Probably because the main disk is still visible so it wants to restore it to that disk. Maybe if I could make the main disk disappear completely by disabling it in the BIOS I could use the System Image to install to the other disk, but I have not found a way to do that.