Windows 7 - Windows XP compatability mode Vs VMWARE

Hi all

Just some thoughts on using "XP mode" or Vmware for Virtual machines.

1) XP Compatability mode

XP mode is better integrated and can run typical business legacy apps from the desktop quite nicely -- more suited to "1-off" virtual machines for a normal "Office" type user.

Windows XP SP3 guest OS is already installed and activated and from windows explorer can view local HOST disks from the VM.

Currently FREE complete with a copy of Windows XP SP3 (and it's got keys already built in -- the serial number is in the text file).

BUT - screen adapter only works in 16 bit mode so don't run Photoshop or any photo editing software. You also need to do a bit of fiddling to enable "classical networking" althouth IE Internet browsing is enabled "straight out of the box".

You also need VT enabled to run this which means a 64 bit CPU. (Note you DON'T have to be running x-64 of course).

I'm not sure if the Virtual PC software which this runs on supports any guest OS'es other than windows.

2) VMWARE

Better overall performance and a better screen adapter so you can use photoshop etc decently.

However you need to obtain separately, license your OS and install it just like a physical OS.

You don't need to use VT however - you will need this feature to run a 64 bit guest.

You can run VM's "In Teams". -- If you don't know what that means - you don't need it but for those that do this is actually quite a useful feature.

Easier also to "Clone" VM's -- not impossible with Virtual PC but this is straight from the menu with vmware.

P2V and V2P operation is possible.

So "You pays your money and takes your choice".

For an office type scenario Compatability mode is good.

For home users / developers I'd go the "separate software like vmware / virtual box" route.

As an experiment I'm going to see if I can do a V2P (Virtual to Physical) conversion of the XP mode built in XP system and see if it's "activateable" or even needs activation.

Will report back on that later.

Cheers
jimbo

nice post mate,

whats better for a home user, virtual box or vmwareplayer (the free one)

which is faster and will any of them run aero in Windows 7?

thank you

Hi there "Penalty taker"

Virtual Box is free and can allow you to define and create virtual machines.
Vmplayer only allows you to use already created and configured virtual machines.

However using QEMU.exe to format some virtual disks you can by creating a config file build some virtual machines which you can use with vmplayer.

Both are good but probably if you don't have vmware workstation Virtual Box might be easier to set up and use.

The vmware software doesn't actually need VT enabled to work. Not sure about Virtual box.

Vmware server is another FREE solution which you can use to create virtual machines -- whilst a little bit complex as a free solution I'd look at that one.

The "stand alone" software like vbox / vmware is likely to perform better because it's running as a totally sepaarate application and doesn't have to handle the "Integration with Windows" -- but remember compatability mode is new and will certainly be improved -- particularly from the video - as the current video driver only gives 16 bit colours etc.

None of them will run aero yet -- that's a current limitation of the VM environment.
3D and other graphics won't work due to the "Virtual Bios" and hardware in current vmsoftware.

You could try "XEN" in a linux distro -- but that's definitely not a task for anybody other than a Guru. Even to get Windows to work under Xen is a real challenge but if you can do it then you *Should* be able to get aero to work.



Cheers
jimbo

i'v used both in the past but was wondering if things changed dramatically, i like virtualbox as its VERY simple to use and looks more clean in windows mode.

I deal a lot with VMs, getting Microsoft Dynamics AX VMs as part of my job. These are usually huge, perhaps 24GB, and with lots of applications installed - Server 2003, SQL Server, Project Server, Dynamics AX, Excel, Word etc. They need a good chunk of memory to perform well.

The first thing I do is convert these from Virtual PC to VMWare format. VMWare is just *so* much snappier than Virtual PC 2007. I had a quick look at Windows Virtual PC (the new beta) yesterday, and I still think VWMare performs better.

I'm running VMWare Workstation on the Win 7 RC and it's running VMs very well.

I've not tried VirtualBox but it does look worthwhile investigating.

Just my thoughts...


Jim

Thread Moved

Have been playing with Virtualbox, (needed a copy of XP to hand for testing), and As far as I know you do not need the hardware visualization to run.

Also on the latest version there is an option to enable 3D Acceleration, only running on 2 GB so not sure what it will do for graphics capabilities.

VirtualBox

The thing most people here seem to be missing with Windows 7 Virtual XP mode is the seamless application integration from the XP Virtual machine to the Windows 7 host, people are trying to compare VMware & Virtualbox to the new Windows Virtual PC, but none of these others offer the level of integration to make this a truly useful tool.

I'm not so sure it's *that* useful. Vista has been out for three years, and the number of applications that don't run on Vista must be getting less and less each day. Of course, there's always esoteric stuff, and 16-bit apps, that won't work - but do people still really, genuinely need to run them?

I use virtualisation every day - as I write this I have three VMs running. But for me it's whole-system VMs that I need - at the moment I have three separate copies of Windows 2003 server running as virtualised machines.

Microsoft has clearly introduced this functionality to persuade people to make the leap from XP to Windows 7 - they now have no excuses for "...it won't run on Vista/Win 7..." etc.

I accept that my situation will be different to many others. But as a Microsoft Gold Partner working with lots of customer and end-users, I can't think of anyone who would need this new feature. They either need full-system virtualisation, or nothing at all.

Anyway, this thread has gone a bit off-topic (partly my fault) so I'll apologise for that....


Jim

Hi there
this feature is for your typical "Office" user. If you are running several VM's then this feature is NOT intended for you. The feature assumes that you can just one time install your apps and in cases where the guest OS will rarely change.

Imagine you have an old Legacy CRM or even a "Call Center / Service desk" type application (for example SAP CIC or maybe your own version).

Imagine also that you have say 60 PC's.

Now you can say install 5 new Windows 7 PC's running exactly the same software without disrupting the business with "New servers" etc etc.

The "Built in XP" system works straight from the Box -- no (or very limited) guest configuration and installs required. No extra networking facilities required either. This just plugs straight in.

Users just click CIC application just like they did in the past and see identical screens etc etc.

You can then gradually update the rest of the hardware also without altering your main applications, corporate servers or firewalls.

Now you can also look for possible Windows 7 software solutions.

This solution isn't intended for Power users / developers or LARGE organisations who will probably have a whole IT dept dedicated to this sort of stuff but will allow small to medium businesses to upgrade almost 100% painlessly.

(A network of 60 PC's might be considered Large and it probably would have a dedicated IT dept - but you should get the idea).

People have very much missed the whole point of "XP compatability mode" if they are comparing this with stand alone software such as VBOX and VMWARE.

Cheers
jimbo

TBH from what i'm reading around here, I think almost everbody has missed the point lol