For all you Dual Booters out there

Lets face it Dual booting seems to cause more headaches than it helps.
There is no reason to use a dual boot method when running Vista as your main OS
go to:

http://www.vmware.com/products/server

Down load the "Free" VMWare server software and get you serial Number, It requires some participation on your part, Install the VMWARe server onto your Vista PC,
Make sure to do some reading first so that you understand the concept.
Just a brief overview
Vista is your Host OS. you then can install XP (and a variety of other OS's) within Virtual machines created by VMWARE, they all can run at the same time and you can switch between with just a mouse click.

I replaced 3 systems by implementing this software, I use several different VPN type to connect to variuos clients, and the VPN's don't play together on the same machine.

I have 2 XP virtual machines running on top of my Vista install along with Vista 64 bit, Windows 2000 server/2003 server/2008 server. Once you learn this product you will never dual boot again..

I needed I can advise via this forum

I am a pro

D

 

Seems there are major issues if running an AMD dual core processor. Have you set up VMware on an amd dual core?

 

Sorry, I can't face it as it has never been a problem for me.

XPSP2
PCLinuxOS
Fedora7

Running two OSs' at once, now that would be a problem. Which one am I accessing these files from? Which one did I save these files to? Is my PC powerful enough to run two OSs' simultaneously?

 

I dual boot my system simply there are certain apps, that just run better on XP, and they don't run really well in a virtual environment. I've been using virtual machines for years, and I must say, they are very nice, and sometimes very convenient, but make sure your machine has enough memory since they share the physical memory of your computer.

 

RootbeaR

You got the concept wrong, the virtual PC is running on its own area of the drive, The systems do not share system files you can't get them mixed up. please just do some research on VMWare of VirtualPC. I like the fact that I do not have to wait for a reboot to access my other system.

For Instance, I installed the Vista SP1 on my Vista Business 64bit virtual machine. while that's installing I can toggle back to my main system and continue work, I can fully test the SP1 on my virtual system with out worrying about crashing my primary. And all without rebooting.

I do database support and have to use different VPN's for different Client, these VPN's do not always play nice on the same machine, but with a virtual pc I have eliminated these problem. No doubt some horsepower is needed. I have an Acer with Intel Duo2 Quad
processor with 3 GB memory and 2 500GB drives. Thats about average of what you pull from the shelf at the stores.


SWB I have not had any apps fail me ( Yet ) BTW I liked your web site..

d

 

Most things run okay in a virtual environment (Microsoft, Adobe Yahoo, blah blah blah), but I use some high end deployment tools on my network at my job that just run better in a pure environment. By the way, thanks for the positive feedback on my site. It's obviously still a work in progress. Web Design is just something I have been dabbling in lately.

 

SWB

On your website,, do you get a decent request for the remote support. (Please don't quote numbers ) What package do you use for the remote connection. I know there is quite a few out there..

Also do you web a web development package for your website? I use WebEasy 7 pro.. It's a pretty user friendly package if you don't know allot of HTML and CSS language, and I don't.

Sounds like we have somewhat similar jobs, I do a substantial amount of network support and SQL database management, also I get allot of requests for cleaning off the bad stuff from people's computers that they have managed to download, I seem to have a knack for conquering the spyware or popup adware that folks seem to get.. I love a good challenge..

Looks like everyone has a catch phrase. how about this

d

If an illegal alian is called an undocumented worker, Is a drug dealer called an unlicensed Pharmicist ??


It's not my creation but I like it.

 

I rarely fire up XPSP2 and can access the files that are there any time I want without rebooting. From Linux I can access all drives to read and write to.

I rarely play games and never am I working and decide I want to play a game. So I don't need to reboot to do that either as I don't leave my PC on all the time.

I have 1.5 GB RAM of which I will soon be removing half a GB, not needed, as opposed to buying more to boot into a virtual environment. My set-up works fine without spending money.

I can see the benefits of a virtual set-up but for myself it is not needed. Most people I know want a PC to use to do simple tasks safely and quickly. Telling them to go buy another 2-3 GB of RAM is not what they want to hear.

e.g. I have seen online different people saying how cheap external modems are. I told a friend to buy one last week telling him they are cheap, $20 or so, he called back saying it was between $60-$90, before tax, cheapest place he could find. Prices are different here for PC accessories. Neither of us are in the big smoke nor like getting things shipped as shipping usually brings it to par with just purchasing outright anyways.

1GB of RAM here is $90 and up. Last year it was about $180.

 

I use dot5hotsting.com http://www.dot5hosting.com/dot5/index.bml
to host my website. So far as remote access go, basically I provide the user with a confirmation number that they can use to download a small plugin that allows me to connect to their machine through port 443 using my browser.