Microsoft just released Virtual PC 2007 as a free download. Like VMWare ![[WikiPedia]](http://www.mikeyp.com/css/external.gif)
, Virtual PC 2007 lets you install several operating systems on one PC at the same time. I decided to try it out today and compare it to VMWare's free VMWare Player.
VPC07 installs nicely, and is unobtrusive. Unlike VMWare, it doesn't seem to install any background services. (VMWare runs four services in the background whether you use a VM or not.) Configuration was simple and typical Microsoft - just a basic properties dialog, and no VMWare-style text file edits. Booting from an iso is extremely straightforward.
VPC07 is tailored to run variants of Windows, but I decided to try a few versions of Linux instead, including Kubuntu, SimplyMEPIS, ZenWalk, and Puppy Linux. MEPIS and Puppy ran perfectly on the first try, but Kubuntu and ZenWalk both needed the DefaultDepth value in xorg.conf to be changed from 24 to 16. Apparently, VPC07 emulates the S3 Trio video chipset, but does not support 24-bit color. This fakes out some video auto-detection scripts.
Unlike VMWare Player, VPC07 allows you to switch between windowed mode and full screen. However, sometimes my WinXP start menu bar would pop up on top of full screen virtual sessions. And as with other full screen apps that change the video resolution (i.e. games), all of my WinXP desktop windows and icons were moved and resized.
In all cases, Linux ran noticably slower under VPC07 than VMWare. And the heavier the desktop, the slower it ran. KDE-based desktops like Kubuntu and MEPIS were the slowest, with the XFCE-based ZenWalk being faster, and Puppy's tiny JWM running at nearly native speed.
Believe it or not, Microsoft actually provides some accelerated drivers for Linux virtual machines, but they're a hassle to get. You need to visit http://connect.microsoft.com, drill through the menus until you find the Virtual Machine Additions for Linux beta (why don't they just call them "drivers"?). This link might work: https://connect.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?SiteID=154. The download process is almost hysterical. Instead of providing the drivers in a tarball, they are packaged in an iso file. But instead of allowing you to download the iso, you need to download a .msi installer that installs the iso to your Program Files directory. But you can't actually download the .msi file without using Internet Explorer, which in turn installs the Microsoft ActiveX Downloader program! After all of that hassle, you'll eventually discover that the Microsoft Linux drivers are only tested on certain versions of Fedora and OpenSUSE. I have yet to make them work.
Note that this hassle is not needed if you are using a variant of Windows instead of Linux.
Virtual PC 2007 actually has a lot of potential. I love that it is smaller and easier to use than VMWare. If they can fix the performance issues with Linux, I'll never use VMWare again. But of course, why would Microsoft fix Linux performance issues?
You read Ballmer's rant against Linux I assume? Apparently Vista sales have not been that good so they want to go after patents and not naming any specific ones just like SCO. I thought Gates said he didn't see Linux as a threat. Guess they changed their minds. I think they ought to take the "can't beat them, join them" approach and make their next Windows Linux based. Otherwise I predict they'll lose big time.
I suppose Novell SUSE Enterprise is the new "Microsoft Linux Distro". I haven't tried SUSE in years, but I hear it looks pretty nice now.
Any bets on MS Office for SUSE? 
