(Damn Vulnerable Windows XP: Lesson 7)

{ How to Increase the VMWare Boot Screen Delay }

1. Why slow down the VMWare Boot Screen Delay?
   • Sometimes a person might want to use a bootable CD or USB flash drive, that contains an ISO file, to clear a password with Hiren's or remove a Virus with Kaspersky.
   • Unfortunately, you have to have Jedi Ninja reflexes to Left Click and press the <Esc> button once you see the VMWare Boot Screen to access the Boot Menu.
   • Fortunately, the VMWare virtual machine configuration file (.vmx) allows you to delay the boot process by using the bios.bootdelay configuration parameter. E.g., bios.bootdelay = "20000".
   
   
2. Pre-Requisite
   • Damn Vulnerable Windows XP: Lesson 1: How to create a Damn Vulnerable Windows XP Machine
   
   
3. Post-Requisite
   • Hiren's: Boot CD: Offline NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 Password Changer
   
   
4. Lab Notes
   • In this lab we will do the following:
     1. Discover the Path of the VMWare virtual machine configuration file (.vmx)
     2. Configure the bios.bootdelay configuration parameter to delay the VMWare Boot Screen by 20000 milliseconds (ie., 20 seconds).
    
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1. Open VMware Player on your windows machine. (On Host Machine)
   • Instructions:
     1. Click the Start Button
     2. Type vmware player in the search box
     3. Click on VMware Player
   • 

    

2. Edit Virtual Machine Settings
   • Instructions:
     1. Click on Damn Vulnerable WXP-SP2
     2. Edit Virtual Machine Settings
   • Note:
     • Before beginning a lesson it is necessary to check the following VM settings.
   • 

    

3. Copy Working Directory Path
   • Instructions:
     1. Click the Options Tab
     2. Click on General Settings
     3. Highlight the Working directory
     4. Select Copy
     5. Click the OK Button
   • 

    

4. Open Notepad on your windows machine. (On Host Machine)
   • Instructions:
     1. Click the Start Button
     2. Type notepad in the search box
     3. Click on Notepad
   • 

    

5. Open File (Part 1)
   • Instructions:
     1. File --> Open
   • 

    

6. Open File (Part 2)
   • Instructions:
     1. Paste the Path that you copied from (Section 1, Step 3)
     2. Select All Files (*.*)
     3. Select Damn Vulnerable WXP-SP2.vmx
     4. Click the Open Button
   • 

    

7. Add Boot Delay
   • Instructions:
     1. Add the following line directly underneath .encoding = "UTF-8"
        • bios.bootdelay = "20000"
   • Note(FYI):
     • This will introduce a 20 second delay before the virtual machine loads up.  The value of 20000 is represented in milliseconds.  If you only wanted a 10 second delay you would change the 20000 to 10000.
   • 

    

8. Save File and Exit
   • Instructions:
     1. File --> Save
     2. File --> Exit
   • 

    

9. Start Up Damn Vulnerable WXP-SP2.
   • Instructions:
     1. Start Up your VMware Player
     2. Play virtual machine
   • 

    

10. Access the Boot Menu
    • Instructions:
      1. Notice your time delay (See Picture)
      2. Left Click in the vmware screen and Press the <Esc> key
    • 

     

11. Boot Menu Navigation
    • Instructions:
      1. The Boot Menu provides you options to boot from the (1) Removal Devices, (2) Hard Drive, (3) CD-ROM Drive or (4) Network.
      2. Press the <Esc> Key to exit the Boot Menu
    • Note(FYI):
      • We pressed <Esc> to exit the boot menu, since we did not previously load an ISO.
      • If you would like to have practice booting from an ISO, I encourage you to do the following lesson.
        • Hiren's: Boot CD: Offline NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 Password Changer
    •