Product Development Solutions by Keith Taylor: Hyper-V

Windows 8 is a new beginning for Microsoft Flagship OS. You should experience it first hand yourself. You can download it from this location:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/br229516

Once you have downloaded the appropriate ISO to your environment you can then follow the below steps to install Windows 8 on Microsoft Hyper-V running on Windows Server 2008 R2.

Microsoft has a new blog post on the Windows 8 blog that covers this topic and I believe you should read it before you get started:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/09/16/running-windows-8-developer-preview-in-a-virtual-environment.aspx

Note: I have already created a new Virtual Disk and new Virtual Machine outlined in previous posts on my blog:

Now that we have our Virtual Machine created we will need to configure our it to load the new Windows 8 OS. From inside the Hyper-V Manager you need to select and then right click on the new Virtual Machine that you are loading Windows 8 on and select Settings as show below:

Next we will need to configure the IDE Controller that host the DVD Drive to load the Windows 8 ISO image we downloaded earlier. You do this by selecting the correct IDE Controller (IDE Controller 1) in the image below:

In the "Media" section it asks you to specify the media to use with your virtual CD/DVD drive. Note how I selected Image file option and then browsed to where I download the Windows 8 ISO?

Next you need to click on Apply to set these changes to our new Virtual Machine.

You are now ready to start up the Virtual Machine by right clicking on the Virtual Machine name and selecting Start:

As your Virtual Machine starts it will boot up from the DVD and start your Windows 8 Install. Below are the steps to install Windows 8:

As I am in the United States I accept the defaults and click Next:

Once you have clicked Next you will see the below screen, click on the Install Now button:

After click on the Install Now button you will see Windows 8 give you the "Setup is Starting" message as shown below:

As usual Microsoft wants you to agree to their licensing terms. Select the "I accept the licensing terms" check box and then click on the Next button:

After agreeing to the licensing terms and clicking Next you will need to select which type of installation you want. I chose Custom which in my case means a new install:

Now you need to tell Windows 8 where to install. As I only added one Virtual Hard Disk to my Virtual Machine there is only one option where to install Windows 8 and it is selected by default. Click Next:

Windows 8 will start the install processes as shown below:

NOTE: the longest part of any windows install is the expanding windows files step and Windows 8 is not exception so be patient:

Once all of the files are expanded and Windows 8 finishes the next few steps you will have to go through multiple restarts / reboots as show below:

Once the restarts/reboots are complete you are greeted with another Licensing screen where you need once again to say you accept the terms to be for sure, for sure. Click the I accept check box and then click the Accept button:

Now that you have accepted the licensing terms you will now start the personalization phase of the install. Below are the usual screens when setting up Windows:

The next screen is where you decide what type of log on you will be using. Windows 8 is designed to leverage you Windows Live ID and I will be using this, but for a debug machine I want to use a local account. In the below Screen select "Don't want to log on with a Windows Live ID?":

In the below screen you want to click on the "Local Account" button that is not highlighted by default:

Fill out the below screen with your user credentials and then click the Next button (highlighted in Red) that will light up once you have completed filling out the screen:

Once you click Next in the above screen you will then watch Windows 8 finish setting up your Virtual Machine:

Congratulations! You have now installed Windows 8 in a Virtual Machine!

I do a lot of debugging and am also involved in a lot of technology previews. In my experience I have best been served experiencing and debugging new technology on virtual machines. As I am about to install the new Windows 8 OS on a Virtual Machine I thought I would share the steps I follow when setting up a new VM. Below is an article from Microsofts TechNet that describes how to create a virtual machine but it lacks the detail that someone new to Virtual Machines would need:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc772480.aspx

Below are images that show how I filled out the Virtual Machine Wizard:

NOTE: how I am selecting an existing Virtual Hard Disk? You can see how I created the new disk in this blog post: http://nkeithtaylor.blogspot.com/2011/09/hyper-v-creating-new-hard-disk-for-your.html

Once you click Finish in the Virtual Machine Wizard, Microsoft Hyper-V will create your new Virtual Machine that will be our starting point for installing Windows 8 in this case but can easily accept almost any OS.