Windows

Installing Windows 11 in a Virtual Machine on Windows 10 to test software compatibility

October 17, 2021 by Simon

This is a simple post that shows how I Installed Windows 11 on Windows 10 inside a Oracle VM Virtual Box Virtual Machine.

I love Windows 10 and have many applications I rely on for work and fun. Before I update to Windows 11, I want to test my software in a Virtual installation of Windows 11.

I could:

Remove my Windows 10 Drive (nVME SSD) and insert new drive and install a fresh copy of Windows 11.,
Upgrade my primary Windows 10 to Windows 11
Install Windows 10 inside a virtual machine.

If all goes well I will upghrade my primary Windws 10 machine.

Virtual Machines

A Virtual Machine allows youn to install an Operating System in a virtual environment (as long as you have enough processor cores, memory and storage space).

I am collecting many Virtial Machines from WIndoiws 1 to WIndows 11.

I cna can run upto 6 VM’s at once (normally virtual Box does not like more than this running at once.)

Downloading Windows 11

To downlaod Windows 11 visit https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows11

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows11 Screenshot

I selected Windows 11 in the dropdown then clicked Download.

I selected English language

I then selected 64-bit Download

The Downlaod (ISO File) was 5.1GB)

The ISO file downloaded

Before You Begin

Before you begin, set your Processors Power Plan to High or Ultimate (how to). Virtual Machines rely on a fast processor and having your power plan on Power Saving plan is a bad idea.

You will need at least 4 spare processor cores, memeory etc

Also consult your Mainboard manual and enable Virtualizaion/SVM (Google will help)

Now I need to set this up as a Virtual Machine in VirtualBox

Setting up a Windows 11 Virtiual Machine

Download Oracle VM VirtualBox from Downloads – Oracle VM VirtualBox and install it.

In Oracle Virtual Box click Machine then New

I named the machine”Windows 11“, Set Type “Windows“, Version “Windows 10 (64bit)”, this is jujst to allow the mahcien to boot (its not gong to install Windows 10).

I set 8GB of memory and selected “Create a virtual hard disk now“

I allocated 70GB storage to the disk (dynamically allocated) as a VDI file type

Under System I enabled PAE/NX (Physical Address Extension – Wikipedia) and allocated 8 Processor cores (4 is enough).

Under Display I allocated 256MB video memory and enabled 3D Accelaration

Under Storage for the virtual CD-ROM I attached the downloaded (above) ISO Image for WIndows 11.

The Windows 11 ISO Image was attached to the virtual CD-ROM

I am now ready to strat the Windows 11 Virtual Machine for the first timn.

Starting the Windows 11 Virtual Machine

I started the Virtual Machine

The Virtual Machine is starting

Windows 11 Boot Logo (this is a good)

Windows 11 is asking for a language and time and currency preference.

I clicked Next then Install

Setup is starting

I was prompted to enter a serial.

I purchased one from VIP-Scdkey: The Professional Marketplace to sell Digital Game keys, Gift Cards for #27.53 USD

These are single use keys

I received an error “This PC can’t run Windows 11. THis PC doesn’t meet the minimum requirements to install this version.”

Researched a Fix

I researched a fix and I needed to enable “Enable EFI(special OSes only)” in Virtual Bax.

Start the Virtual Machine Again

I started the VM again and was greeted with UEFI boot screen

Virtual Box was booting the Virtual Machine via UEFI

Turn Off TPM etc

I started the Setup again and wnt to the wizard step with “Install now”.

I pressed Shift+F10 to reveal a command prompt

More Information here.

In the command prompt windows I typed “regedit” and pressed enter and added the keys as described here.

I exited the registry editor and command prompt, pressed back and resumed the setup.

I entered my serial number again

I accepted the terms

I selected Custom install.

I clicked Next

Setupo was installing 🙂

When setup finished the Virtiual Machien rebooted

WIndows was starting services

WIndows setup took many minutes.

Windows rebooted again

Setup was processing for few minutes.

Windows 11 boot screen is very bright.

Windows 11 Setup

I selected Australia as the country

Setup was thinking.

I selected US as the keyboard type

I skipped adding a second keyboard layout.

Windows was checking for updates

Setup spent a few minutes thinking

I entered a PC name

First Boot

Now Windows 11 is almost ready

Much thinking (I should have installed this on a solid state drive not a magentic spinning drive)

I selcted that I will use this PC for personal use

It looks like I cannot have a stand alone account. I entered my Microsoft email.

I validated my Microsoft account

I have linked my Microsft account to Windows 11

I created a login pin

I set the pin

The pin applied

I turned off location and diagnostic data

I ticked all experience options.

I skipped pask OneDrive Backup

I skiped Office Microsoft 365 trial

I prefer to buy one off Office serial keys

I skipped the XBox game pass

Windows 11 looked for updates

Windows 11 is getting ready again

A few minutes

I should have installed this on a solid state drive

Windows 11 Setup is Complete

Yay, Windows 11 is installed, much bloatware was installed by default

Updates

I fiorst looked for Windows updates.

I installed all software updates

I rebooted Windows 11 one more time.

Timezone

The time was wrong so I set the right timezone.

I set my timezone

I had to sync the time.

Right Click Menu

I noticed that the traditiona rigth click menu for files has been moved to a sub menu

Themes

Looks customizing your theme is back now.

It looks like Microosft is now selling themes and icons.

I enabled Desktop Icons

Inlike all the main icons

That is better

I uninstalled all the bloat software

I uninstalled all other software that I was not going to use.

Dark Theme

I set the Dark Theme

I opend Edge and turned off syncing my data

I had to find the task manager

I linked my Android mobile phone

I noticed Virtual Desktops are back

Boring Widgets

Why is Microsoft parterning with Sky News?

I hid all stories from Sky News Australia.

I set defaults in my Task Bar

Task Manager has not changed

I disabled Teams

Virtual Box Guest Addons

I installed Oracle VirtualBox Guest addons

I opened the connected drive from Windows Explorer

Run VBoxWindowsAddons.exe

I installed the Guest Addons

Now I can run higher resolutions in the Virtual Machine

Resize the Disk

I realised that 70Gb was not enough to install all of my applations.

I shutdown the WIndiows 11 Virtual Machiene and expanded the disk to 150GB in the Oracle Virtual Media Manager

I booted Windows 11 and enterred the Disk Management Snap In and tried to expand the disk.

The problem was a smaller partiton was between the end of the 70GB disk and the new free space.

I installed my valid copy of EaseUS Partiton Master software but it did noallow me to move and resize the partition.

I downloaded and installed AOEMI Partition Assistant.

I cliked “Resize/Move Partition” on the smaller partition.

I nextended the 70GB partition to 150GB

Long story short, the Deme version cannot make chnages. I purchased AOMEI Partition Assistant and moved the smaller partition and resized the 70GB disk to 150GB

AOEMI Partition Assistant created a Windoiws PE Boot Image to carry ouit the disk changes. Nice

The disk operations started after the reboot

Nice progress bar.

All disk operations completed

Increased Disk

Yay, the Windows 11 disk has been increased.

Testing Software

Now I can install all of my software and test it in WIndows 11.

Office 2021
Adobe CC (Photoshop, Adobe DC, Premere Pro, After Effects, Media Encoder)
Filezilla
WinDirStat
Discord
Blenmder
DUMo, SUMo
balenaEtcher
Sublime Text 3
Visual Studio Code
WinSCP
Putty
WinRAR
WInMerge
NotePad++
VLC Media Player
GIMP
CDBurnerXP
7Zip
Agent Rancsack
YubiKey AUthenticator
Core Temp
CPU-Z, GPU-z
etc

I will not be able to tets games on this Virtula Machine though.

All apps so far are working a treat.

The spinning magnetic disk is a bit slow though

Conclusions

Windows 11 has presented no issues yet. Some things are hard to find but this will be ok, I will upgrade to Windows 11 when all the bugs are ironed out in a few months.

TPM Security

Windows 11 required your processor has TPM compatibility.

Recent Mainboard BIOS have been adding TPM support, but I bought a physical TPM chip to have BitLocker not die when I upgrade my BIOS.B

In my BIOS I can select the BIOS-based TPM (“Enable Firmware TPM) or the Physical TPM (Enable Discrete TPM)

AMD Processors

It looks like AMD Processors are having issues with Windows 11 so I will hang off on installing Windows 11 on my main PC

I will move the Virtual Machines to a Solid State drive to get extra speed. Guide here: Moving Oracle Virtual Box Virtual Machines to another disk

Version: 1.1 Added Moving Oracle Virtual Box Virtual Machines to another disk (fearby.com)

How to create a Private GitHub repository and access via SSH with TortiseGIT

July 17, 2021 by Simon

Here is a guide on using the GUI TortoiseGIT, GIT for Windows with GitHub.

Creating a GitHub Account

Make sure you have a GitHub account (free is OK) https://github.com/

I used my defined hardware Security Key

I clicked New Repo

Repo Settings

I set Private
Added a readme
Set .gitignore for Visual Studio files
I had no idea what licence to select (read more on licences here)

I clicked Create repository

Creating RSA Keys

Now I will create an SSH key to protect communications with GitHub.

When logged into GitHub, I clicked the SSH and GPG Keys menu

I clicked New SSH Key button

GitHub wants a public SSH Key

Setup Git Locally

I checked to see if the “git” command was installed on my local machine.

I will install Git from https://gitforwindows.org/

I download Git-2.32.0.2-64-bit.exe and started the installer

Folder C:\Program Files\Git

Set Options (e.g I like Check for Daily updates)

Start Menu Folder

Text Editor: I like Sublime Text from https://www.sublimetext.com/3

Set an Initial Branch name

Set 3rd party software options

Set HTTPS options

Set Line Endings preferences

Set Terminal Emulators preferences

Set Git Pull default preferences

Set Credential Manager preferences

Set Extra Options

Experimental Options

Installing

First Launch

Git is installed

Install Tortoise GIt

Visit https://tortoisegit.org/

Download Gif (64bit)

I started the installer.

Licence Agreement

SSH Type

Components

Install

Installing (Wizard)

Language: English

Shell Extension

I checked for a known git path.

I set my desired git username and email

I set desired SSH settings

Folder for Code Repositories

I create C:\Code\MyTestRepo

Before I can clone a repository I need o set the past to SSH in TortoiseGit.

I right-clicked on C:\Code\MyTestRepo and selected TortiseGit\Settings

I expanded the Network Node and set the following as the SSH Client

“C:\Program Files\TortoiseGit\bin\TortoiseGitPLink.exe”

I saved the Settings.

Clone a GitHub Repository via git and Tortoise GIT

Now I can clone a repositor to C:\Code\MyTestRepo,

I right clicked on C:\Code\MyTestRepo in explorer and clicked Git Clone

I added by GIT URL (Obtained from GitHub), I also set the path for the Private Key I created earlier.

I was informed that the key is in the wrong format

I need to convert the RAS Private Key to a Putty PPK Key

Convert an RSA Key to a Putty PPK with PuuttyGen

I opened the Open Putty Gen

I click Load and select the id_github_test private key I created earlier

I entered my private key password

The private key loaded.

Now I can export the private key to a PPK format

Clone (with a PPK Private Key)

Getting back to cloning a repository I right-clicked on C:\Code\MyTestRepo

I set the PPK private key

I entered the password

I accepted the key

The Repository started cloning.

Creating a Quick Visual Studio Project

I created a quick Visual Studio project and saved it to C:\Code\MyTestRepo\Hello World

Visual Studio files were visible in C:\Code\MyTestRepo

I Commit the new files to the repository (main branch)

I selected desired files to commit

Files were added

I right-clicked on C:\Code\MyTestRepo and selected TortoiseGit\Push

Files are now visible in GitHub

Awesome

Setup on Multiple Machines

I set up Git on multiple machines, cloned, made chances, committed those changes and pushed. I was able to Sync down those changes to each machine.

Good advice on Using Git

Happy Coding

Finding software that needs updating on Windows using SUMo (Review)

May 30, 2020 by Simon

Recently I blogged about using Acronis True Image 2020 to backup and restore your Windows computer after a friend had to manually reinstall her Windows PC.

Her Windows PC died and she could not recover Windows with a System Restore snapshot or via the retailers systems image recovery process.

I use Back Blaze software to automatically backup my computer but I do not have an up to date collection of needed installation files in case I need to perform a Clean Installation of Windows 10.

I found SUMo in the process of assisting my friend.

SUMo to the Rescue

I found SUMo (Software Update Monitor) from KC Softwares that allows me to analyse my existing installed software and their versions, find and download new versions (installers or setup files) for my software.

I am using the Pro version of SUMo (buy here).

Tip: The trial version will inform you of an update but it will not show you links to obtain the updates easily.

SUMo Trial Limitations

The best feature of SUMo is I can find apps on my PC that need updating.

Also in one click (Right click) you will be directed to the applications official site (official site (or App page on SUMo)) and be able to download the app installer to the new version of the app.

Rigth click on an outdated app in SUMo to get the new aopo.

The Trial version is limited to informing you that an update is available.

SUMo telling your there is an update available

Also updating SUMo to the PRO version streamlines it’s own updates too. You can update SUMo in the PRO version with one click. 🙂

SUMo Pro Scan

After I opening SUMo PRO (I waited for it to find installed apps) then I clicked “Check” to scan all my apps for updates.

SUMo happily went through the list of my installed apps and gathered the applications versions (and checked online if newer versions existed).

SUMo found 239 installed applications on my PC, 188 were up to date, 53 needed minor (recent updates) and 2 needed major (old) updates.

Its awesome that in one click and I can see what software needs updating. In the process I was able to see what applications I don’t use (they were old versions) and I uninstalled them

SUMo Settings

I will update my software and to ensure my software does not get out of date I enabled “Load at startup” and “Check for new software at startup” (SUMo).

I did not enable “Scan for new software at startup” but seeing SUMo Start and update will remind me to check for updates if I have time.

I also enabled “Show file path” in the SUMo Application list so I can see where the programs are. I found multiple instances of Python installed all over my PC.

Getting Application Updates

I right clicked on each of my applications (that needed updating) and clicked “Get Update from…” then “.. from developer’s Site (Direct)“.

If you don’t want to right click you can click the “Get Update” button in the tool bar to get selected applications update.

This will open a web browser page to the software vendors website.

SUMo also has a page available with stats on the application’s known statistics (nice table of versions, beta or stable status and numbers of users).

Updating Software

I was able to right click “Get Update from…” – “.. from developer’s Site (Direct)” for each application in the list that needed an update. I was directed to the software vendors page for each software where I could download the app updates.

Within minutes I had dozens of vendor pages open with links to new versions of my outdated software.

Dozens of site pages with fresh app installs.

Within a short period I had amasses gigabytes of new application installs.

4.5GB of data of new application installs

I installed each of the new updates and then moved the new installs to my B:\Installs folder (in case I have to manually reinstall Windows in the future).

Checking Application Update Status

After I updated my out of date applications I then right clicked on the apps in SUMo and clicked Check to re check the status of the applications

SUMo Right Click Actions

Fyi: SUMo has a number of actions in the right click menu (on an installed Application).

Delete: Removes item from list. Will appear again on next scan or manually addition
Ignore: Blacklist : this Software/company pair will never appear again, whatever the version, file path, …
Skip: Items remains listed but a SPECIFIC version gets no longer notified as update for a given time (1 day / week / month) or forever.

(snip from here)

I had a few items I Deleted from the list or Ignored.

My Visual Studio (development) software was reporting an older version of Python (2.7). I updated Visual Studio to the latest version but Python 2.7 remained. I deleted Visual Studio from the list and was prompted (this is not deleting the application from the hard disk just from the generated list.

After a few hours updating apps

I whittled down the list of my applications that needed updating

I could sort applications in the list by OK status or apps that needed Minor or Major updates applied.

All Apps Updated

I can now say that all of my Applications are all up to date.

Export

I used the export feature in SUMo to build an excel file listing all my applications.

Fyi: SUMo exported this list as a “;” separated file, I opened the file in Sublime Text Editor and replaced “;” with TAB and then pasted this list back into Excel.

Conclusion

SUMo allowed me to update my installed applications and update my aged cache of application installs I was keeping in case I needed to manually rebuild Windows.

SUMo made this an absolute pleasure to do.

Pros

Price: 19.99 Euros (about $33.27 AUD) is a bargain.
Simplicity (it just works so well, why does Windows not do this)
Saves me time finding out of date apps and update files for an emergency and inevitable manual Windows reinstall.
My apps are more secure after updating them

Cons

I needed this in my life 10 years ago
Would be nice to have an inbuilt help file (instead of email support)

Try the free version here

v 1.0 Initial Post

Open a Windows 10 Boot Camp Installation on OSX in Parallels (like a VM)

April 29, 2018 by Simon

This guide will show you how you can open a Windows 10 Boot Camp Installation on OSX in Parallels (like a VM).

Installing Parallels on a Mac allows you to install Windows in A VM, this is handy but you may want to install Windows on a Mac drive with Boot camp (guide here) for better performance.

Can you load this VM-less Windows install in OSX rather than reboot it, the answer is YES (with Parallels v13).

Setup your Windows Bootcamps (see my guide here).

Create a new VM image in Parallels (Select Boot Camp)

Click Continue

Confirm the reaction warning.

Name the VM and choose a location

Set desired memory etc.

Choose your desired clipboard and disk access settings.

Done, now Parallels will prepare your VM (Really Boot Camp)

Preparing

Parallel tools will be automatically installed.

Done, you will now be able to load your Apple Bootcamp partition as it is was a VM inside OSX (or boot it)

yes, the VM file is pointing to the Boot Camp partition.

I hope this guide helps someone.

Ask a question or recommend an article

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Revision History

v1.0 Initial post

How to install Windows 10 Pro alongside an OSX partition with Apple Boot Camp

April 20, 2018 by Simon

This guide will show you how to install Windows 10 Pro alongside an OSX partition with Apple Boot Camp.

I have a number of guides on moving away from CPanel, Setting up VM’s on UpCloud, AWS, Vultr or Digital Ocean along with installing and managing WordPress from the command line. I use OSX to develop and occasionally need to use Windows to achieve some development tasks, this is how you can install Windows on an Apple PC.

Apple Boot Camp

Apple Bootcamp software can be found here: https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201468

Bootcamp Steps.

You can download a Windows 10 ISO here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-au/software-download/windows10

You will need to plug in a 16GB or larger USB key to use as an install medium.

Download Boot Camp

Download AppBoot Camp here: https://support.apple.com/en-au/boot-camp

Start Apple Boot Camp, click Continue, Tick all options, select the Windows 10 ISO file (beware Bootcamp will select the first ISO file it finds, ensure your USB is selected, Click Continue (tip: You may need to er format and prepare the USB key 10 times, Apple Bootcamp is not the most reliable program), It may take 6 hours to copy files pre Window Setup).

Choose your Windows partition size (at least 200GB is ideas)

When the Bootcamp Wizard is complete you can reboot into Windows (automatic at the end of the wizard)

Enter the desired details in each step (e.g Local, Windows Key, Windows Version, Partition and Country etc)

Loads more steps like Keyboard Layout, Domain, Microsoft Account, Password and Cortana and Privacy etc.

Windows is now installed, Apple Bootcamp will set up appropriate drivers for your Mac,

While this is happening I will install Google Chrome Canary.

Bootcamp has now finished setting up drivers.

Windows 10 Start menu (I prefer OSX’s simplicity)

You can set up your prefered Startup disk in the Apple System Preferences or press the Option key on startup and choose a partition to boot.

Update: Open a Windows 10 Boot Camp Installation on OSX in Parallels (like a VM)

Read this guide will show you how you can open a Windows 10 Boot Camp Installation on OSX in Parallels (like a VM).