Tech Spot

This solution may apply to anyone trying to extend a primary boot volume in Windows 2003 Server (mine happened to be the R2 Enterprise edition, but may apply to prior versions of 2003 Server).  I was following VMware KB  1007266  to extend the boot volume on this Windows 2003 guest VM on ESXi (3.5).  This is a separate issue from the Microsoft KB # 841650 . Everything was fine when I attached the newly extended VMDK file to my helper VM.  But I kept getting the "The volume you have selected may not be extended" error and couldn't figure out why.  It turns out I didn't read the KB carefully enough.  Make sure you assign a drive letter in the Windows Disk Management UI first! Before assigning a drive letter: DISKPART> list disk   Disk ###  Status      Size     Free     Dyn  Gpt   --------  ----------  -------  -------  ---  ---   Disk 0    Online        16 GB      0 B * Disk 1    Online        56 GB    24 GB DISKPART> list volume   Volume ###  L

If this update keeps showing up on Windows Update but can never install because you're somehow missing the file PROPLUS.MSI - you may be able to complete it finally!  It's an important update and ranks as a high security thread on Secunia PSI. Go to this site, http://www.billynda.com/ and save the file "Proplus.msi" (you may have to right-click on it and choose Save link as...).  Remember which directory you saved it to so you can browse to it again during the XP installation. Now run Windows Update again and start the updates.  When it asks you for the PROPLUS.MSI file, browse to the location where you saved it.  The update should complete.