It’s best to limit installations to those that are supported. It’s possible that some operating systems not listed here will run successfully as guest operating systems but versions that aren’t fully supported may run slowly or crash frequently. VirtualBox adds support for OpenBSD, FreeBSD, Solaris, and OpenSolaris running as guests. All three VMs support OS/2 and some versions of Linux.
VirtualBox also provides support for Windows 7, Windows Server 20 as guest operating systems. Once you’ve installed the VM application, you can create a virtual machine that runs DOS, Windows 3.1, Windows 95 or 98, Windows NT, 2000, or XP, and Windows Vista.
Neither Parallels nor VMware offers support for Solaris or OpenSolaris and none of them offer support for FreeBSD, although support is being developed by VirtualBox.Īll three VM applications offer support for several versions of Linux and for some versions of Apple’s Mac OS X.
Any VM application that runs under Windows 7 should run under Windows 8 but I haven’t tested that. Hosts and GuestsĪll three VM applications run under most versions of Windows although VMware doesn’t yet claim support for Windows 7.
I selected VirtualBox, in part because it’s an open-source application that’s available without charge and in part because it supports more host systems than Parallels or VMware. The three primary VM applications are Oracle’s VirtualBox (acquired when Oracle purchased Sun Microsystems), Parallels’ eponymous Parallels, and VMware’s equally eponymous VMWare. VirtualBox running Windows 7 on Apple's Mac OS X. VirtualBox running an Ubuntu installation on Windows on my computer. Space for the VMs can usually be on a drive other than the primary drive if that’s more convenient for you.
The VM software doesn’t require a lot of space but you’ll need to allocate space for each virtual machine and that could consume a considerable amount of space. Operating systems such as Vista and Windows 7 need far more memory than that just to function reasonably well so the practical minimum RAM for a computer with VMs installed is probably 4GB for 32-bit systems and 8GB for 64-bit systems. Most operating systems need at least 1GB of RAM (exceptions would be DOS or Windows 3.1) so splitting 2GB of RAM between a host and a guest would produce less than optimal results for both. Typically the primary operating system is considered the “host” and the secondary operating systems, the ones that run inside VMs, are described as “guests”. A computer with only 2 or 4GB of RAM could have trouble because you’ll need to allocate some of the main operating system’s RAM to the second operating system. Possibly the most critical component is memory. So the first thing to consider if you’re thinking of running VMs on your computer is whether it has enough power to do the job. After all, two operating systems will be sharing the computer’s CPU, memory, network connections, and all other components. Whether this is a good solution for you depends on whether the performance degradation is acceptable.
If, instead of setting up a dual-boot computer, you install software that creates one or more “virtual machines” (VM), switching from one operating system to another takes just seconds and two or more operating systems can be running simultaneously. There is a better way! But I have to include this weasel word: Maybe. And because you have to choose at boot time, only one operating system can run at any given time and switching between them is a chore. Although boot managers are generally reliable, occasionally they become confused and that does not bode well for any installed operating system. If you need to have more than one operating system on a computer, you may have set the computer up as a dual-boot system so that you can choose which operating system to run when the computer starts. If you enjoy today's articles, Virtually Perfect