ColTom2 wrote:
> Not knowing anything about either dual booting or Virtual PC 2007 it looks
> as if Virtual PC 2007 would be much simpler to accomplish, as I assume that
> you do not have to do anything to partition HD's. Looks as if you could
> download and install Virtual PC 2007 and you would be ready to upgrade to
> Vista or am I missing something? If this is the case why would anyone want
> to do otherwise?
>
> What are some of the Pro's and Con's of Virtual PC 2007 and also can you
> use the work around to use the Vista Premium upgrade version rather than
> full version? Can you at some point uninstall either XP or Vista at a later
> date?
>
> Also do you have to install separate applications for each i.e.Anti-Virus
> etc?
>
> I would like to be able to upgrade to Vista in the simplest manner while
> retaining XP MCE because of the many application problems.
Dual-booting (or multi-booting) means that you install another operating
system onto a separate partition or - preferably - a second hard drive.
When you want to use the other operating system, you restart your
computer and choose the other OS from the boot menu. Note - there are
issue dual-booting XP and Vista, do a search in this newsgroup for that
topic with Google Groups Advanced Search.
The disadvantage to dual-booting is the inconvenience of restarting
every time you want to run the other OS. This can be annoying if the
only reason you want the other operating system is to run one program.
The advantages are that you are using the real hardware (see below for
explanation) and you only need the amount of RAM in your system that is
optimal for both operating systems.
Virtualization is done by running software such as Virtual PC, VMWare,
or Parallels (Mac) and then creating virtual machines. Each virtual
machine runs its own operating system. When you want to use another OS,
you simply start the virtual software from within the host system as you
would any other program. Then you run whatever virtual machine you want.
No rebooting is necessary.
Some of the advantages of virtualization are that you can run many
operating systems that would not normally be supported by your computer.
For instance, on my XP host running VPC 2004 I have virtual machines of
DOS, Win3.1, Win95, Win98, and OS/2. You need licenses for all the MS
operating systems you run because the VM's are real installations and
you need drivers for all the emulated hardware.
Some disadvantages are that the host machine needs to have a fairly
hefty amount of RAM in it. The hardware that the VM OS sees is emulated;
it is not the hardware that is actually in your computer. For example,
on my older VPC we can't play Win98 games that require a joystick
because that hardware isn't emulated. VPC 2007 may emulate more
hardware; I haven't played with it yet.
I hope that answered some of your questions. Any further questions about
VPC should be posted to its newsgroup - microsoft.public.virtualpc.
Malke
--
Elephant Boy Computers
www.elephantboycomputers.com
"Don't Panic!"
MS-MVP Windows - Shell/User
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