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I've got a HP Pavilion Laptop that came with Win 7 already loaded. I shrunk the main partition and installed Ubuntu. There's a partition called HP_TOOLS. I did not see a partition for Win 7 installation disks.

If I want to create a VM for Win 7 on top of Ubuntu, where do I get the install disks?

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This question is outside the scope of this site, as it does not relate directly to Ubuntu. Please post it somewhere else, like perhaps the Ubuntu forums. Thank you! :) – SirCharlo Apr 22 '12 at 2:35
Probably no need to repost. I expect if you just searched on Super User you'd find that variations of this question have been asked, answered, speculated on, disagreed with, flamed over, sliced, diced, and sautéd many times already. – irrational John Apr 22 '12 at 2:53

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To obey the law you would buy a valid license key to install Windows 7 to a new system plus, obviously, the install media (DVDs).

If I recall the Microsoft EULA correctly, you need a "full" version of Windows 7. That is, a version which can be installed to a system with no (Windows) operating system installed. You are not allowed to use a (potentially lower cost) "update" version of Windows 7 in a Virtual Machine.

If what you are thinking is to somehow track down the files on your HP laptop to recover/reinstall Windows and use that as the install media for a VM, that is even less likely to work. The recovery tools on your laptop almost certainly will check for the specific hardware context of your laptop. Your virtual hardware will look nothing like that and the tools will refuse to install Windows.

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