Ghosting my old XP laptop onto my new MacBook Pro???

[Zeusmotorworks]

First, I'm not only new to Mac, but new to anything more than surfing the internet and downloading/using my car tuning software. So I'm basically computer ignorant, but a quick study.

I just bought a new Macbook Pro... I've installed Fusion and XP. It's up and running fine.

I'm a home user trying to figure out how to ghost my old PC laptop onto my new Mac. I not only do not know how to ghost/store the image , but how do I get the image onto my new Mac from my home network.

I've searched around here, but must not be using the right key words to find what I'm looking for.

No one HAS to hold my hand, but can anyone please point me in the right direction?

 

[Mindflux]

You aren't going to be able to do this. Ghost is a full system backup with the intention of restoring onto the same system. Since your machine doesn't even remotely have 'like' hardware you cannot restore it and expect XP to work.

Why not just transfer your files over?

 

[Zeusmotorworks]

Even if I'm already running XP in a virtual machine on the Mac?

If I can only transfer the files, how would I just do that over my home network? I'm not sure yet how to get my virtual machine to reach outside my Mac.

Thanks for the reply.

 

[Mindflux]

Even if I'm already running XP in a virtual machine on the Mac?

If I can only transfer the files, how would I just do that over my home network? I'm not sure yet how to get my virtual machine to reach outside my Mac.

Thanks for the reply.

The problem with windows in general (maybe most closed sourced OS's these days) is that the drivers loaded to boot your hard disk are almost 'set in stone' after install. If you change from one hardware vendor to the next windows will blue screen booting up because you are missing the hardware it has drivers for.

When I bought my iMac last October I just hooked a lan cable between the two and gave them both a static address on the same subnet.

ie: i made my imac 192.168.1.1 and my PC 192.168.1.2

I then shared out the C drive in it's entirety on the PC.

Then you can hit cmd-k from the desktop of your macand connect to smb://192.168.1.2/C (or whatever you name the share) and drag and drop your files.

I'm sure you could do it within the virtual machine too, but I wasn't that far along yet when I did mine.

Moving files between OS X and Fusion is as easy as dragging it from your OS X folders right into the Fusion window.

 

[Zeusmotorworks]

Thanks... Guess I'll be dragging files. The only reason I HAVE to keep XP is my car tuning software, and you can figure I'm "lucky" even having XP for the Gov't side.

I like the idea of being able to just hard wire the two and "drag and drop".

 

[Mindflux]

Thanks... Guess I'll be dragging files. The only reason I HAVE to keep XP is my car tuning software, and you can figure I'm "lucky" even having XP for the Gov't side.

I like the idea of being able to just hard wire the two and "drag and drop".

Funny. I keep XP around on my laptop for car tuning software too Do keep in mind that any software you had installed will require a re-install in your Fusion-ified XP setup. The files can be dragged and dropped but you may not have a functional piece of software due to registry modifications that the installer would have made.

Don't hesitate to ask more questions. We have a great group of users here.

I see you are in Austin as well. If you ever need any help and don't feel wonky about some stranger stopping by to assist I'd be more than happy to do so when we both have a free moment.

 

[kenoh]

VMConvertor

OK, I did this easily. First thing is to forget Ghost, dont go there. I did it by going to the VMWare.com website and downloading the free vmconvertor tool.

Use that installed on your old laptop to create a VM image of your machine either to an external USB drive (easiest) or to a location on your old machine (tool handles this and doesnt image it twice).

Then once the conversion is complete, either transfer the resulting files on your external drive to your mac or use the network file copy approach mentioned in the previous reply.

Once you have the VM files on your mac, open them in VMWare fusion and voila, it will read them and fire up your VM...

It will take a while to boot the first time and you should install the vmtools as it makes a difference.

Hope this helps.
Ken.

BTW, you are IMPORTING the machine in vmconvertor...

Good luck!

 

[Mindflux]

OK, I did this easily. First thing is to forget Ghost, dont go there. I did it by going to the VMWare.com website and downloading the free vmconvertor tool.

Use that installed on your old laptop to create a VM image of your machine either to an external USB drive (easiest) or to a location on your old machine (tool handles this and doesnt image it twice).

Then once the conversion is complete, either transfer the resulting files on your external drive to your mac or use the network file copy approach mentioned in the previous reply.

Once you have the VM files on your mac, open them in VMWare fusion and voila, it will read them and fire up your VM...

It will take a while to boot the first time and you should install the vmtools as it makes a difference.

Hope this helps.
Ken.

BTW, you are IMPORTING the machine in vmconvertor...

Good luck!

This sounds pretty snazzy. I'll have to check it out for future reference. I did not know this existed. How does XP handle the massive changes to hardware with VMConvertor? Here's a link for the OP.
http://www.vmware.com/products/converter/

 

[kenoh]

XP VMWare convert

XP didnt complain on mine. It hasnt asked for activation or anything...

beautiful thing is that Fusion also handled the network for me and EVERYTHING was transparent.

AND I couldnt believe that the VM actually runs FASTER than the dedicate hardware it used to run on! got to love that!

Good luck!

 

[Zeusmotorworks]

If I didn't love this machine so, I'd throw it and the PC through the window!!

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=5917733#post5917733