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Written Saturday December 04, 1999, 06:00

I spent yesterday evening installing Windows 2000, RC3 onto a VM, and thought you might be interested in some of the highlights and lowlights. The graphics are all fairly small-ish Portable Network Graphics format (PNG) files. I have embedded the full-size images in display pages to overcome the less-than-optimal support for PNG in the most popular current browsers.

The process I followed was probably foolhardy, but it worked, so don't knock it. I installed over an existing, functional Win95, with an operating installation of Office 97, Netscape 4.7, and a couple other widgets that I would rather not download and re-install. Since overloading is generally regarded as a bad thing, with installs from bare metal being preferred, I thought I would be stubborn/stupid and do it this way instead. I installed the CAB files from the CD onto a subdirectory (copy routine 1, about 10 minutes), extracted their contents (copy routine 2, over 30 minutes) ran the initial install (which I was too interested in to get screen captures from - maybe next time) program, where I select options to upgrade my installation of windows and convert the underlying filesystem to NTFS - I thought, why not live dangerously, besides, then I can eventually test NTFS access under Samba from Linux to Win2k.

So then the initial install program, running under Win95, copied all the files it wanted for installation (copy routine 3, about 20 minutes) to another location (I presume, it didn't tell me where), and then the VM rebooted for the first of four times, although this was pre-announced (how nice). Upon coming out of reboot, we see the screen to the left, which is copying the files to prepare for installation (copy routine 4, thankfully the last, about 15 minutes) Then the initial splash screen for Windows 2000 Professional pops up, as you see to the right. Everything runs just a little like molasses, but then I have a VM running on a 233MHz PII, and the VM only has 64 Meg of RAM to play in - it simply is going to be slow. So be it.

Then I was greeted by the filesystem check and convert routine (to the left). This was the kicker, thought I. Especially when it reached that bit at the bottom, where it tries to convert the system to NTFS. It trundled and trundled, and came back, just as happy as a clam in a clam bed (as opposed to a clam in boiling water, which is briefly, intensely unhappy). Color me surprised. Someone must have been talking to Steve Gibson, of Spinrite fame. Then we get the next splash screen (linked to the right), where you can't see that it says 'Please wait...' I did a lot of waiting during this install, but I expected that, and read my Learning Perl book in the interim [Learning Perl sidelight... Chapter 6 is tiny, about 3 pages long, including exercises, about I/O. Easy, to set you up for the sucker punch, Chapter 7 on Regular Expressions. I have studied regex's before, and everytime I don't have to use them for about, say, a week, they flee from my brain. Sigh].

Now the full size images really begin to suck, unfortunately. What you can almost see in the thumbnails is squiggly black text on grey backgrounds fades to grey on grey in the full size images, but we shall push on anyway. To the left is represented the device installation and configuration routine - I could have wished for a more verbose process, where it said something like 'I found a keyboard, and it's a Dvorak', which would have been a lie, of course, but then I could have noted it and gone in to correct things later (maybe). As it is, nothing is told to you. Why can't they figure out time remaining, the way they can with downloads? Ah, well. The shot to the right is an equally uninteresting bit of grey on grey which is representing the Network Settings setup going on - this actually grabs all of the networking info from the previous Win95 install, and imports it whole - the network and DSL worked at first blush, once setup was done - This install routine may not TALK much, but it does a good job.

Installing Windows 2000 components was the heading on the next setup screen (linked to the left), and we were about 62 minutes into a 45-55 minute process... I thought that this might be auspicious. The only problem with the progress bars is that they are just about as fitful as the progress bar in detecting new hardware in prior versions of Windows - They start slow, then move quickly for a moment, raising your hopes. Then the bar dashes those hopes against the rocks far below, as it stops entirely, boding ill for getting to sleep before midnight. But this step actually completes in a reasonable 5 to 10 minutes. Then comes the fun. The screen shot to the right is entitles Performing Final Tasks. This is apparently a process named by the guy who did the marketing for the military's MRE (Meal Ready to Eat, three lies for the price of one)... Final tasks take another hour. ANOTHER HOUR??? Ah, well, someone (who shall remain nameless because they were wrong, wrong, wrong <g>) thought it was time that I stopped and did a figurative 'bare metal' installation. But stubborn old me forged ahead.

We shall skip one screen shot, because it is another of the 1 hour 'Final Tasks' dialog. I will show you success, instead, to the left. Counting from the time I actually instigated the install process at about 19:00 hours - total install time was about 2.25 hours. Not too shabby, really, given the underlying and virtual hardware. Of course, now I am left with a 640x480 environment. This simply won't do, so I execute the VMware Tools package, which terminates in showing me a readme file, which consisely and correctly guides me through the process of updating the video driver to the VMware SVGA driver, end of that step shown to the left. This leaves us with the final screen shot of this report, below. (Did I hear you mutter thanks to God under your breath? Yeah, you! That's OK, thanks for your patience, and reading this far.) Voila!