Not too long ago… around last May or so, I’d say, I began my search for VM software, besides MS VPC2007, that would run on Windows Vista. I didn’t like Microsoft’s solution because they do not support Linux. So if I ever had Linux installed in the VM the additions would not supply drivers/file sharing/etc with the Linux guest OS. After looking at many pieces of software I finally found one worth a stamp of approval. It is called VirtualBox by innotek.

VirtualBox is written under the GNU General Public License so it is available for free! That’s right it doesn’t cost a penny. VirtualBox has all the normal features. File sharing, DirectDraw Support, Live resolution changing, USB, saving and resuming VMs. It also supports a number of things I have not seen in any other free solution. It supports Windows x64 on AMD64 so it is 64bit, it supports AMD-V (which is AMD’s Virtualization layer that is built on newer AMD processors), it also supports many different kind of APCI/APC/ETC modes for debuggers.

The GUI is friendly and for the most part if you have used VPC or VMware using VirtualBox will not be a problem. The only complaint I have as far as the GUI goes is the extra step taken when choosing VirtualHDs or CD-ROM ISOs. When adding ISO’s it first brings you to its CD Image Manager there you have to click add, find the file, select it, select it again this time from the CD Image Manager, then finally you have selected a ISO for your VM. It’s not really that much work the and the manager is a nice idea it just always feels like an extra step when I am trying to zip through the VM set up process.

I do have a few small issues sometimes when running this product under Windows Vista. Sometimes shutting down or saving a VM just fails and for no obvious reason I have to go into the task manager to kill the process. Only thing is that doesn’t work… the window disappears but the VirtualBox.exe process continues to run taking about 30MB of my RAM. I’m assuming this bug will be fixed over time.

Overall VirtualBox is a great product considering the price. If you do not like MS VPC2007 and do not want to pay for Vmware I’d recommend taking a look at this product. You can find more information, screenshots, and downloads of VirtualBox here.

See ya later!

Tags: general, computers, windows, linux, os x, virtual machines, simulation