Windows XP Mode - Nice one Microsoft

Ronaldo said:

I guess this cannot be fun on a AMD machine unless it uses a server cpu?

Err most AMD chips support AMD-V (or whatever it calls it's virtualisation tech) since the Athlon 64!

Hi all
I've been testing this-- if you want to have a go yourselves you can download at "The green devil". Look for "XPM".

Remarks so far

1) Very nice Integration with W7 desktop.

2) The windows XP machine's virtual screen driver is based on "S3" and is only 16 bits -- not a real problem as we want to use W7 in "XP" compatability mode - not as a full bloodied Virtual machine in it's own right -- you can still log on to it of course.

3) The XP VM doesn't require any "Activation" or Keys.

4) It's not part of a "Network" so you won't see it as a separate machine on your LAN. However IE6 does work in it (default) and you can with windows update install IE8.

5) Windows explorer will show your HOST drives as well as the "Virtual drives" directly so you can cut and paste data between HOST and VM drives without the need for "Host only" or other networking. You don't need to "Share drives" etc.

6) Video, and Sound are "Virtual" devices from the "Virtual Bios". You can add real printers, scanners etc through USB/COM/ etc ports.

7) printers, scanners, cameras that I've had work fine as well as the Minidisc applications. Nice to see my MD simple burner (rip CD direct to Minidisc) again on the desktop.

8) you can make a short cut to an application in the VM directly to the W7 desktop -- works a treat.

9) There isn't much point in running things like Office etc on this VM since these apps work fine on the Host machine.

10) not suitable for games etc. -- Running a VM like this makes it SIMPLE for typical Legacy hardware with some apps to work that CAN'T work in W7. This VM is NOT intended to be a full featured Virtual machine -- use a "Classical" VM program and install your own VM if you need this feature.

11) Configurable from the HOST W7 by simply right mouse clicking on the "Virtual Machine" image in explorer.

12) Default Virtual RAM is 256MB. Depending on your applications you might want to "Up" this to 512MB or even 1GB.

The only caveat I can see is that your machine MUST be VT enabled for this to work. If it isn't or you only have a 32 bit CPU then you'll have to use some other software for managing VM's such as Virtual Box or Vmware workstation.


All in all I'm impressed --don't compare with a fully featured VM say running under VMWARE workstation -- this software isn't intended to replace that type of development.

All in all well done Microsoft. This is about right for its intended audience. For serious developers etc you will need to use "Classical" VM software but for small businesses etc who don't want to upgrade everything in one go - especially PC hardware this is a real "Killer App".

Cheers
jimbo

Thanks, Jimbo. Haven't gotten that far yet. Good to know.