Unable to boot Windows 2008 R2

[anjithk99]

Hi Team,

I have a windows 2008 R2 VM in proxmox which we forgot the local administrator password. I'm trying to boot with CD drive so that i can bypass the windows password security and use the machine. I have added Windows 2008 R2 ISO file in CD Drive and then changed the boot order to CD Drive then hard disk but nothing seems to work out. Its directly logging into login page.

Any help on this will be highly appreciated

 

[aaron]

Is it possible, that you missed the prompt to hit a key?

AFAIR Windows ISOs check for an existing installation and if present give you a few seconds to boot from the ISO.

 

[anjithk99]

Hi Aaron,

Thanks for your reply. You're right i haven't done that. Could you please kind enough to tell me how to do that in proxmox. Will it need to be done manually or some other option. Sorry for being so dumb.

 

[aaron]

The best approach in my experience is to open the noVNC console of the powered off VM. Then use the noVNC on the left side that fold out to power on the VM. You should then be able to see the whole boot process and hopefully see the prompt from the ISO so you can hit a key fast enough