Multiple Operating System

bluesnake

I've done a bit with workstation7 and server 1&2, and found VirtualBox to be better than any of them, as it at the was faster and offered more features.

Never used the VMplayer, told it would only play, and the was on an official VM course

johnmc

I can confirm that VMware player will allow you to setup an OS on a Virtual Machine.

I run Vista on my laptop but occasionally need XP for some programs and for my scanner. No huge strain on RAM etc. I was using an old desktop, but it was too slow and was a hastle transferring the files.

I had a spare XP Pro (legit!), so it was a no-brainer.

Set up a shared folder and speeded up the process considerably.

I can now, effectively, run 2 PC's on the same machine, at the same time (only 1 "machine" can accept input at a time, so you can't use the scanner on the VM and the printer on the host).

dan3811991119

It much better to partition your hard drive off and use the windows dual boot menu if your wanting to multi boot 2 windows operating systems. However I could never see a good purpose for setting up a dual boot unless you want to run really old software.

Lum

VMWare player did recently get the ability to create VMs. I was surprised too!

I do rather like it, since it supports 3D acceleration in the guest OS well enough that playing games in your VM is feasible.

bluesnake

dan3811991119 wrote: »

It much better to partition your hard drive off and use the windows dual boot menu if your wanting to multi boot 2 windows operating systems. However I could never see a good purpose for setting up a dual boot unless you want to run really old software.

Really old as in Netware 4 and dos, yes they are not supported on the drop down box. OK, you do loose cpu cycles and not all hardware is compatible an d you can forget real time too. I would not recommend vm's in regard to film transcoding either.

The good side are snapshots, portability of the whole machine, dynamic growth of virtual disks. Cutting and pasting of text from one computer to another, quick booting, ability yo run 2 or more systems at the same time. If you catch a virus, both machines are not lost.

IcyEars

dan3811991119 wrote: »

It much better to partition your hard drive off and use the windows dual boot menu if your wanting to multi boot 2 windows operating systems. However I could never see a good purpose for setting up a dual boot unless you want to run really old software.

The obvious one is if you want to use Linux and Windows. I use Windows for work related stuff and Linux for personal stuff. As I said before at the moment I'm triple booting mine with Windows 7, Ubuntu and OSX Mountain Lion with a Transfer partition for data so I can easily swap between them (not strictly necessary as Linux and OSX will read and write to the windows NTFS partition). Since it is an HP laptop I also have a partition for the HP QuickBoot system and a spare for playing (did have Windows 8 and before that Fedora on it but currently blank).

As I said previously, mutliboot or VM depends on why you want to run more than one OS. Both have their advantages and disadvantages.

Whilst all of this is obliquely relevant to the OP, it may be a bit off topic and possibly OTT in terms of detail. It might be better to set up a separate thread on the Pro's\Con's of multipartition\VM PC habitats!

prowla

I use VMware player on my machine daily, and have "guest" VMs running Windows 7, 8, XP, Server and Linux & Solaris which I can use simultaneously with my "host" Windows 7 64-bit OS.

It works best if your PC hardware supports the "VT" virtualization capability.

Even before Player let you create VMs there were websites that you could do it via.

(As far as Windows 8 goes - yeeeuuuk!)

andrewjf

IcyEars wrote: »

The obvious one is if you want to use Linux and Windows. I use Windows for work related stuff and Linux for personal stuff.

I'm living the dream - using Ubuntu on my work PC, and everything else