[2 Bunny]

I thought I'd give Windows 10 a try in the virtual machine using VMWare player, but I'm just not having any luck with it. My host computer is a lenovo laptop with a Pentium T2390 dual core processor running Windows 7 x64, attempting to run Windows 10 x86 in VMWare player (apparently my cpu is incompatible with virtualization of 64 bit operating systems). When I boot from the ISO, I see the blue windows "pane" for a few moments, but right before the little round dots are supposed to appear underneath it, I get:

"Your PC needs to restart.
Please hold down the power button.
Error code: 0x0000005D
Parameters:
0x3060F0D
0x756E6547
0x6V65746E"

Just to see what would happen, I tried a 32 bit Windows 8 ISO as well and got the same exact thing (yes, I do have "Windows 8" selected as the guest operating system inside of VMWare player, and I have tried other options as well just to see what would happen, they all do the same thing). A Windows 7 (or earlier) 32 bit installer iso will boot up just fine. I have "Burned" this iso to a USB drive and successfully booted the Windows 10 x86 installer on two computers (including the one on which it refuses to work in a VM), so I know that the iso is good and that the computer should be compatible (I did give the bios setup a quick run down to make sure there weren't any virtualization settings that might conflict with what I'm trying to do as well and didn't see any).

Any ideas why it won't work?

 

[2 Bunny]

FIX

Ah Hah! I answered my own question. Apparently the problem was that even though my processor supports DEP (or "No Execute"/"Execute Disable"), it is disabled in BIOS by default. The catch is that because this was a "value line" computer, there is no option in the BIOS/setup screen to enable this.

The key to getting things to work was following the directions in this thread over on the lenovo forums and use SYMCMOS to change the settings. Here's a step-by-step for anyone else who might happen to be stuck in this boat with a Lenovo N200 or similar laptop:

1. Use Rufus to create a bootable USB drive of FreeDOS.
2. Download Symcmos and place it on the root of the newly created USB drive.
3. Download a DOS text editor. I used "edit" (simply open the ZIP file and extract EDIT.exe to the root of the USB drive).
4. Boot from the USB drive and use the command "Symcmos -?" to see all the commands and their usage.
5. Run "Symcmos -Lsettings.txt" to export all the current settings to a text file called "settings.txt".
6. Type "edit settings.txt" to open the exported file and see all the things that can be changed. The Number on the left in parentheses identifies the setting and the number on the right in brackets configures the settings. For example, The number accompanying "(0267)" will be "[0001]", which means, "disable D.E.P.". Remember that these will be different for other computers, so make sure to find a definitive list somewhere for your computer explaining the definition of each "Token". Identify all the items you want to change, and now go back to the top of the document where it says, "CRC = *something*". Write down your CRC and create a new text document that starts the same way as the original ("CRC = *whatever your crcnumber is*) and paste underneath that all the values that you wrote down earlier that you wanted to change. Following this format, my document looked like this when I was done (the second setting is a fix for LCD stretch-o-vision when displaying anything on the screen other than its native resolution, how neat!):

CRC = 3EDD
(0042) [0000]
(0267) [0000]

7. Save this file as something other than what you exported your original settings as, ("NewSettings.txt" would be good) and then exit the text editor.
8. Back at the "C:\" Prompt, use the "SYMCMOS -V2 -Unewsettings.txt" (replace "newsettings.txt" with whatever you named your file when you saved it if you called it something other than newsettings.txt) to apply the settings.
9. Shut down the computer and turn it back on again. Problem(s) solved! :grin:


Note that this process may very for other models (even different BIOS versions of the same model; for the record my N200 0769 15"er has the latest 3.05 BIOS installed) of computer and may be completely different for other makes. A good place to start if you can't find a DEP option in your BIOS and SecurAble reports that DEP is disabled even though the CPU is compatible with it, would be a web search for "SYMCMOS *your computer*" ("SYMCMOS Lenovo N200", for example).

Best of luck!