How To Install Windows Server 2012 R2 On H340 Hardware With No Vga Cable (Unattended Install) Using Virtualbox

Hi Guys,

Thought I'd share some info I've been collecting the past little while.  I'm currently on a journey to update the OS on my h340 still running the original WHS v1.  This process should cost you essentially nothing (except maybe the ultraISO license if you're not enterprising enough).  I cobbled this process together after lots of googlling and lots of experimentation.  Hopefully someone here finds it helpful.  

prep physical drive: This involved taking your target system drive and seeding it with the windows installer. Note, this will destroy anything on the drive.  Also becareful picking the drive number if you have lots of drives installed.  I had my target drive connected via a USB drive mount.  I opted to go this route because I'm a cheap-ass and didn't want to buy the diag vga cable and go through the hassle of jumpering to enable the KB/mouse and figuring out how to boot the h340 from a USB key and to load the USB Key with the Windows ISO.

1. set the target drive in disk manager to offline (go to disk manager and right click and select offline)

2. set the target drive's readonly attribute

2a. open command prompt as admin

2b. run "diskpart"

2c. list disks with command 

list disk

2d. select target disk #

select disk 1

2e. set attributes on disk 

attributes disk clear readonly

2f. verity attributes 

attributes disk

2g. exit 

exit

3. setup virtual raw disk

3a. run virtual box as administrator

3b. open command prompt as admin go to the virtualbox install directory and run the following command where PhysicalDisk# corresponds to the target drive number seen in disk manager

vboxmanage.exe internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename "c:\path\to\virtualdisk.vmdk" -rawdisk "\\.\PhysicalDrive1"

3c. attach virtual raw disk to vm's storage settings

4. attach the unattended install ISO from below to the CDROM

5. run VM to start OS install.  watch the installer! don't leave it because you want to...

6. power down the VM after the windows installer reboots the system.

7. pull the physical drive out of your system (I had mine connected via USB) and plug it into the system slot of the h340 (bottom bay)

8. turn on the acer h340 and wait about ~30-60 minutes to let the install finish.   You should see the system lease an IP from your router

9. using that IP, connect via RDP.  Do whatever you need to do to setup your new OS.  Congrats!

EnableRemoteDesktop

edit: fixed a typo with creating the vmdk... and the autounattended.xml filename