Post your questions to the MSFT Virtualization team

sygnus21 · 28 Jan 2010

I'm crystal now. This cleared it up for me...

James O'Neill said:

XP mode runs the 32 bit version of XP.

You can't use Virtual PC to run (say) 64 bit Vista on 64bit Windows 7.But you could use it to run 32 bit vista on 64 bit 7

Thanks

Thanks Kari.

Edwin Yuen · 28 Jan 2010

sygnus21 said:

I'm crystal now. This cleared it up for me...

James O'Neill said:

XP mode runs the 32 bit version of XP.

You can't use Virtual PC to run (say) 64 bit Vista on 64bit Windows 7.But you could use it to run 32 bit vista on 64 bit 7

Thanks

Thanks Kari.

Sygnus21,

If you do need to run x64 OSes in a VM, you can use Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2. It's a free download and supports x64 OS inside the VM. I posted a link in the Server thread.

James O'Neill · 28 Jan 2010

Kari said:

What would you VPC geeks recommend to speed up XP Mode? Assigning more RAM, or does it have any effect after 1 gig? What else?

Kari

My 3 rules for improving perf.
1. Add more RAM
2. Add more RAM
3. If there are any empty memory sockets , add RAM.

With XP mode it is always a compromise because adding memory to the VM takes it away from the host. So you need to balance VM performance against host performance.

The other thing which will make a difference is the type of virtual hard disk you use. By default XP-Mode creates differencing disk for each XP VM , a differencing disk is slower than a single disk, and if you have a single disk a Fixed disk is better quicker on writes than the a dynamically expanding disk .

Then the speed of the disk has an impact.

sygnus21 · 28 Jan 2010

Edwin Yuen said:

If you do need to run x64 OSes in a VM, you can use Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2. It's a free download and supports x64 OS inside the VM. I posted a link in the Server thread.

Thanks, I'll probabbly give it a try just to play with, but I really don't have much use for a VM in my day to day computing. But, it's always nice to learn something new; that's why I'm here. :)

Thanks.

sygnus21 · 28 Jan 2010

Kari said:

What would you VPC geeks recommend to speed up XP Mode? Assigning more RAM, or does it have any effect after 1 gig? What else?

Kari

Not necessarily a speed increase, but for photographers, such as myself, or graphic artists, it would be nice to operate in a 32-bit color mode environment should we need to use a VPC or XP mode due to compatibility issues under Windows 7 or 64-bit mode.

I think this would be a blessing for a lot of people.

Kari · 28 Jan 2010

sygnus21 said:

Kari said:

What would you VPC geeks recommend to speed up XP Mode? Assigning more RAM, or does it have any effect after 1 gig? What else?

Kari

Not necessarily a speed increase, but for photographers, such as myself, or graphic artists, it would be nice to operate in a 32-bit color mode environment should we need to use a VPC or XP mode due to compatibility issues under Windows 7 or 64-bit mode.

I think this would be a blessing for a lot of people.

If you disable the integration features, you can use 32-bit gfx.

About the speed, I got some time ago a tip from a colleague to add this to C:\Users\Your_Username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Options.xml, somewhere between the Preferences tags:

Code:

<virtual_machines>
      <enable_idle_thread type="boolean">true</enable_idle_thread>
</virtual_machines><br/>

It seems to give some extra speed but I'm completely willing to admit it's like placebo medicine; it works because I want to believe it works

Kari

sygnus21 · 28 Jan 2010

Kari said:

If you disable the integration features, you can use 32-bit gfx.

Care to help me out (explain), and what "side" effects will this have or cause?

Post your questions to the MSFT Virtualization team-vpc-settings.jpg

Thanks

Kari · 28 Jan 2010

sygnus21 said:

Care to help me out (explain), and what "side" effects will this have or cause?

Thanks

Basically, you do not have access to any of the host's resources if integration is disabled.

This post shows a typical example. Integration enabled, all the host's drives are available. Integration disabled, only way to access host is over the network.

Bidirectional clipboard is also included in integration features, as is printing from XP Mode directly to host's printer.

Kari

sygnus21 · 28 Jan 2010

Kari said:

This post shows a typical example.

Man this is a homework assignment.

I'll have to read through it later.

Thanks. :)

pparks1 · 28 Jan 2010

James O'Neill said:

Kari said:

What would you VPC geeks recommend to speed up XP Mode? Assigning more RAM, or does it have any effect after 1 gig? What else?

Kari

My 3 rules for improving perf.
1. Add more RAM
2. Add more RAM
3. If there are any empty memory sockets , add RAM.

With XP mode it is always a compromise because adding memory to the VM takes it away from the host. So you need to balance VM performance against host performance.

The other thing which will make a difference is the type of virtual hard disk you use. By default XP-Mode creates differencing disk for each XP VM , a differencing disk is slower than a single disk, and if you have a single disk a Fixed disk is better quicker on writes than the a dynamically expanding disk .

Then the speed of the disk has an impact.

I'm a systems admin for a living with a considerable amount of experience with virtual machines...both stand-alone applications as well as hypervisor based products.

My only complaint with Windows XP Mode...is that it's terribly slow compared to other 3rd party products. While I understand where you are coming from with more RAM and faster hard drives...these aren't really necessary with the 3rd party products.