If you are running 64-bit Ubuntu, you can install VMWare Workstation Player in Ubuntu, and then Windows 7 or 8.1 in the VM. I installed 8.1 in a VM in my Linux Mint computer, and it couldn't have been easier -- I had a Windows 8.1 ISO file, so I pointed VMWare to the ISO file, put in my Windows install key, and hit "GO", and it took about two minutes to have Windows 8.1 installed in a VM! I then installed Classic Shell in Windows 8.1, and now Windows 8.1 looks and feels EXACTLY like Windows 7, except that it is a little bit slower than Windows 7 when I access the shared host drive -- but that's probably because I have only 4 GB of RAM in the computer. In fact, if I had, say, 8 GB of RAM, I likely wouldn't even notice that I was running 8.1 in a VM -- that's how good it works!
The one thing you won't get with VMWare that you might get with Oracle Virtual Box is the ability to run Windows apps straight out of Linux without having to open a VM session. That functionality used to be included in the Linux version of VMWare, but they took it out, because they didn't want to devote the resources needed to maintain that functionality.
My Computer
- Computer type
- PC/Desktop
- Computer Manufacturer/Model Number
- Dell
- OS
- Linux Mint 18.2 xfce 64-bit (VMWare host) / Windows 8.1 Pro 32-bit (VMWare guest)
- CPU
- Haswell
- Memory
- 4 GB
- Monitor(s) Displays
- Acer 23"
- Screen Resolution
- 1920 x 1080
- Hard Drives
- Two hard drives, 1TB each: One for Linux, one for my data.
- Keyboard
- IBM Model M
- Antivirus
- Sophos (Linux), Trend Micro (Windows)
- Browser
- Firefox, Opera
- Other Info
- I use Samba to share my data drive with the other computers at my house and with my guest session in VMWare Workstation Player.