How can I take an old Windows PC box and easily produce a VM clone of it?
Solution 1:
You need the (Free) VMWare converter:
http://www.vmware.com/products/converter/
The 'disks' and machines that this converter makes can be used with the free VMWare tools and the disk files also work with (free) Virtualbox.
Read the accompanying info too, but once you get to grips with things it's quite straightforward.
Solution 2:
VMware converter will do this easily. If you want a backup and a VM Backup Exec System recovery will also do this for you. Both work very well
VMware converter