I am running Ubuntu 12.04 off of a variation of the live CD, and an 8 GB USB flashdrive, to which I have installed the OS. I'm doing this because my motherboard and my hard drive no longer cooperate, although I have been able to access the hard disk through a USB adapter. Attempting to run any of the listed variants of Windows in a VM (Virtualisation client: VirtualBox), results in one of the following crashes:

XP: The image isn't recognized by VirtualBox as bootable, even though it is.

Vista: Same problem, although I'm pretty sure the image I have sucks anyway and who really wants Vista?

7: The most success, although Internet Explorer is quick to point out some .dll errors, which don't affect anything, until you power cycle the VM, at which point IE is no longer functional. This is problematic as the only reason I'm using Windows is for IE.

This is probably a problem with VirtualBox, but I thought I'd put it here, just for kicks.

Thanks in advance for any help