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virtual machine

Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 1:15 pm
by civint
I have both XP and MInt on my PC, and I was wondering if it was possible to run my install of XP under a virtual machine, to save having to reboot every time I want to run a wndows program..ie games....and the like..

Also, how would the quality of the games be under a VM? I realise it will be a bit slower, but on older games (of a few years, like rome total war, as the fastest game I would be running..I have no money for PC games!) would it be ok?


Also, what VM would anyone suggest?

Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 2:27 pm
by 900i
Use this VM as it is Open Source and better and faster than VMWare.

http://www.virtualbox.org/


Automatix2 will install it for you if you are new to installing software under linux, get Automatix here.

http://www.getautomatix.com/wiki/index. ... stallation

Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 3:12 pm
by scorp123
With VMware though it is possible to boot your real Windows partition under VMware ... you need to make some preparations first, but the instructions can be found on the VMware forums. This is complicated though! But it can be done ...

If you don't mind having a second installation of Windows (e.g. inside the virtual machine) then go for VirtualBox.

BTW, really old games also work great under DOSemu / DOSbox ... I use this stuff to play my old pre-Windows95 games, e.g. Syndicate Wars, Sim City (the old classic!), Populous, Gods, Novastorm ... and many others :wink:

Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 3:30 pm
by civint
with virtualbox, will I be able to run my existing "real" version of xp from how it is installed anyway? or do I have to reinstall it from scratch (not really a big deal, just a hassle)?

*edit* I am running 512 mb of RAM, so my guess is that I won't be able to run very recent games til I upgrade that....*end edit*

Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 4:11 pm
by 900i
With Virtualbox you will have to install XP again as a VM

Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 6:08 am
by scorp123
True. DirectX and Direct3D require direct access to the hardware, and this is usually not possible with virtualisation software. Maybe the newest release of VMware (VMware Workstation 6 -- $$$) can do this, but then again that software isn't available for free.

So if you want to play games with decent framerates you probably will have to try out Cedega, which is WINE-like (and based on WINE) but supports some Direct3D games (not all though ... you'd have to check Cedega's compatibility lists).

Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 5:59 pm
by whare1
civint wrote: *edit* I am running 512 mb of RAM, so my guess is that I won't be able to run very recent games til I upgrade that....*end edit*
Dont bother I tried with 512 using VirtualBox and the whole system was painfully slow if you want to run a VM I would strongly suggest an upgrade of RAM to at least 1GB so you have enough to split between both operating Systems

Hope you get it running right however you do it :)

Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 7:06 pm
by scorp123
civint wrote:will I be able to run my existing "real" version of xp from how it is installed anyway?
Why not keep that partition for playing games? I guess you could uninstall all the stuff you don't need anymore and then shrink the Windows partition to a smaller size, just enough you can install and run the games you want? You could then install Linux on a separate partition and "dual boot" between the two.

Posted: Sun May 20, 2007 4:56 pm
by Husse
Totally agree with scorp - but civint posted because
to save having to reboot every time I want to run a wndows program..ie games....and the like..
Easy to forget the beginning of a thread :)

Posted: Sun May 20, 2007 9:39 pm
by scorp123
Husse wrote:Totally agree with scorp - but civint posted because
to save having to reboot every time I want to run a wndows program..ie games....and the like..
Easy to forget the beginning of a thread :)
Yes, but then he'd need a more powerful machine with plenty of RAM (1 GB minimum) so it can handle Linux + emulation of Windows API's + the games. And maybe a Cedega subscription wouldn't be bad. If all this is not possible then a dual-boot is the best option ...