All while the “image” sat on my NVMe drive, taking just 1.8 GB on disk.
qemu-img convert -O qcow2 windows-xp.qcow2 windows-xp-shrunk.qcow2 windows xpqcow2
Need a parallel port for an old industrial device? Or a Sound Blaster 16 for that Myst playthrough? QEMU + Qcow2 lets you present fake hardware that XP still recognizes, while the real disk image stays pristine. All while the “image” sat on my NVMe