Use your existing Windows Installation & Apps in Ubuntu

First you will need to boot into Windows natively to make some configurations.

Make a hardware profile for VMWare:

• Click Start > Control Panel > System
  
• On the Hardware tab, select Hardware Profiles
  
• Click Copy, and name the new hardware profile VMWare
  

Restart your computer and boot into Windows again, make sure to select the VMWare hardware profile.

Now to configure the IDE drivers to work with VMWare:

• Click Start > Control Panel > Systems
• On the Hardware tab, select Device Manager
• Select the IDE Controller object and edit its properties
• Click the Driver tab, then click the Update Driver button
• Click Next
• Select Display a list of the known drivers, then click Next.
• Select Standard Dual channel PCI IDE controller instead of the driver that matches your physical IDE controller.
• Click Next, then click Next again.
• Click Finish, then Close.
  

After all of that, shut down windows and boot into Ubuntu.

We're done with the configuring in Windows so now for the rest of the work to be done in Ubutu. If you're mounting your Windows partition under Ubuntu at the moment, unmount it.

• Press Alt-F2 and type sudo gedit /etc/group
  Add your user name to the end of the line that starts with disk, then save and exit. This will add you to the disk group and give you the ability to access your hard disk inside VMware
• Click Applications > Add/Remove... . Install the vmware-server package.
• Click Applications > System Tools > VMware Server Console. Connect to local host. When you're asked for a registration code, visit http://register.vmware.com/content/registration.html to get one (it's free). Select Create a new virtual machine and, in the wizard:


• Create a Custom virtual machine.
• Select the version of Windows you use and name it. Click past the defaults until you get to networking. Choose NAT networking. Leave Buslogic as the SCSI controller.
• On the Select a Disk screen, choose Use a physical disk. Select Use individual partitions and pick both your Window NTFS and Ubuntu Ext3 partition (since part of Grub is on your Ubuntu partition). You can ignore the swap partition.


• If you don't have a floppy drive, go to Edit virtual machine, settings. Select Floppy 1 and uncheck Connect at power on.
• Note: Never start Ubuntu inside the Virtual Machine. If you do accidentally start Ubuntu, turn off Virtual Machine immediately or your files may be damaged as Linux checks a running disk.
• Now start the Virtual Machine. When grub comes up, select Windows. When you're asked to choose a profile, choose VMware.

Your Windows installation should now be able to start inside the Virtual Machine. Congratulations!

The first time it boots, you will see some prompts about new hardware. Cancel them and, in the VMware Server Console, click VM > Install VMware tools instead. Then restart the Virtual Machine when prompted.

That's all. Now you should be able to Use your existing Windows installation and applications under Ubuntu, as well as boot into Windows natively when you need to.