Softpanorama

May the source be with you, but remember the KISS principle ;-)
Home Switchboard Unix Administration Red Hat TCP/IP Networks Neoliberalism Toxic Managers
(slightly skeptical) Educational society promoting "Back to basics" movement against IT overcomplexity and  bastardization of classic Unix

Suse 10 on Microsoft Virtual PC

News

Recommended Books

Recommended Links HOW-TOs

SLES Documentation

SLES life cycle

Certification

OpenSuse

Installation

SLES Registration

Patching

YaST

Apparmor

Pure-ftpd configuration

Baseliners & System information

Startup and shutdown
Processes and Services Package management Disk Management Xinetd Runlevels RC scripts PAM SecurID on Suse
Network configuration Classic Unix Tools Configuring serial console Wheel Group vim Security Tuning Cd and DVD burning
Midnight Commander Advanced Unix filesystem navigation Pushd, popd and dirs Dotfiles Command completion Command history reuse bash Tips Bash
Xen on Suse Virtual appliances   Screen Cool solutions Tips Humor Etc

VPC supports

If you start delving into VPC, I highly recommend reading Virtual PC FAQ.

VPC 2007 only runs on Windows XP Professional and later versions of Windows. You need to modify to modify X server's configuration file to change the default display depth to 16 bits instead of the default of 24.  (A lot of newer Linux distros use 24bit color, which VPC doesn't support)

There are several new features in VPC: 64-bit host support, Vista host and guest support, PXE network booting support, hardware virtualization support, etc...

VPC uses your existing CD-ROM drives as devices in the VM, so it is easy to install a new operating system on a blank virtual hard drive by simply putting the CD in and waiting for it to autoboot. A Sound Blaster sound card and a generic network adapter are also provided as virtual devices.

The virtual hard drive is auto-resizing, so it starts out as zero bytes and only grows as much as it needs to, although according to the Ubuntu install it was a 17.3 GB drive when empty.

Tips

Although performance is decent once you get the OS up and running, the OS installs themselves can be brutally slow. Plan for at least two hours for any OS install, and possibly more.

Microsoft has released a fix on how to fix "the crazy clock" problem…

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=918461#

Ubuntu has a help page for VPC:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/HowToConfigureUbuntuForMicrosoftVir...

Some people have more luck with OpenSuSE 10.0 then 10.2. OpenSuse 10.0 listed as supported by latest version of Microsoft Virual additions.

Scott Hanselman has some great Virtual PC performance tips direct from Microsoft.

Emulated disk performance might be a problem, especially on laptops (with 15K RPM disk it can be OK). In this case it might be worth experimenting with fixed-size disk images, dedicating a separate physical drive to VPC (see the Virtual FAQ). This also means you avoid starving your VMs for memory. With 2G of RAM this is not problem is you are running just two instances.

The transcript of a Microsoft support webcast, "Troubleshooting common problems in Microsoft Virtual PC 2004" contains a lot of useful info and "why we did it that way" background:


Top Visited
Switchboard
Latest
Past week
Past month

NEWS CONTENTS

Old News

[02/22/07] Rick's World - Virtual PC 2007 Bleeding Edge Virtualization

Yeah, yeah, I know. I spend most of my time using OS X these days, but on occasion I do some 'slumming' in the Windows world. I do program Windows for a living, after all. Yesterday, I downloaded Microsoft's new Virtual PC 2007. I wanted to try it because it supports hardware virtualization. This means that the virtual PC that you run should run nearly as fast as your main PC. I wanted to give my first impressions of it.

So far, my first impression is not good. I downloaded Ubuntu Linux as an ISO image. Once installed, I launched Virtual PC 2007 with the ISO image mounted as the CD ROM drive. The virtual machine booted up and Ubuntu seemed to install properly. Once Ubuntu rebooted however, things got bizarre. The virtual machine window expanded to a little wider than my screen size of 1600x1200 and less than half of my screen height. (1600x400? what kinda resolution is that???) I tried everything to get it to work with no luck.

Once Ubuntu failed, I decided to try another Linux, so I downloaded Open Suse. I created a new virtual machine for it, mounted the ISO image again and 'rebooted' the virtual machine. Open Suse came up, got to the splash screen and just stopped. I rebooted several times and trie again with no luck. Finally I rebooted and forced Open Suse to 800x600 resolution. That seemed to do the trick. I left it installing when I left for work this morning. We'll see how it goes.

Another odd and really annoying thing about Virtual PC 2007 is that if you choose 'other' as the type of operating system to install, it defaults to only giving the machine 128MB! That is way too little amount of RAM! Can you imagine trying to run any relatively modern operating system with that little amount of RAM? It'll never happen.

My current theory is that VPC is having some kind of problem with virtual screen resolutions... If you let it 'autodetect' the resolution, it doesn't seem to work right, but if you force it to a certain resolution, it seems to work better.

Why did I call this article 'Bleeding Edge Virtualization'? Because not only am I using a brand new virtual machine app, I'm also trying to run it on Microsoft Vista - a brand new operating system. Maybe the two don't 'get along' very well. I didn't check this, but since Virtual PC 2007 was supposed to be a part of Vista Ultimate Edition, naturally I assumed they would work together. I'll have to try installing a version of Windows in a virtual machine and see what happens... Somehow I think that will go much better. :(

Arcane Code Installing openSUSE 10.2 on Virtual PC Step by Step

In the spirit of collaboration, many of you may wish to explore openSUSE but may not have a spare machine to use it on. VirtualPC is the answer to your problem.

Before we begin, you'll need to download a few components. First, you need Microsoft VirtualPC itself. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtualpc/default.mspx or http://shrinkster.com/lwm. I'm using the 2007 Beta RC1, but this should work with 2004 as well. Previously I've installed openSUSE 10.1 on VirtualPC 2004 with no problems.

Next you will need the openSUSE.distribution, http://en.opensuse.org/Welcome_to_openSUSE.org or http://shrinkster.com/lwn is the place to grab it.

Be warned OpenSUSE ISO image is quite large, you'll be a while downloading it. You will probably want to burn it to a DVD. If you don't have a DVD burner handy, you can also use the Microsoft Virtual CD tool (which will work for DVDs too). I blogged about it at http://arcanecode.wordpress.com/2006/09/13/.

A quick note, there are, as of this writing some issues with openSUSE 10.2 not recognizing the sound drivers with Virtual PC 2007 RC1. If sound is important to you, consider staying with Virtual PC 2004, or use openSUSE 10.1. As sound wasn't that big of a deal, I used 10.2 and VPC 2007, but I've also installed 10.1 under VPC 2004 and my experience was almost identical to what I write about here.

Finally before you get started, spend a few minutes getting familiar with VirtualPC if you have not already done so. You can find my step by step instructions for VirtualPC at http://arcanecode.wordpress.com/2006/09/20/virtual-pc-step-by-step/. Keep it handy, at various points I will be referring to it.

Like now. In Step 1 of my VirtualPC Step by Step you are instructed to create a new machine, please do so. I've named mine "openSUSE". In step 2, you are prompted for your OS. You will need to pick Other. In step 3, you are asked about Ram. openSUSE will run OK under 256 megs, however if you have the available space I'd highly suggest upping it to 512, especially if you intend to get into doing some graphics or mono coding.

In step 4 you will want to create a new hard disk, and in step 5 confirm what you've selected. OK, now you are up to step 6, installing the OS, which is where this tutorial picks up.

The first thing you will see is the boot screen. Here it asks if you want to boot from the hard drive (you can't as nothing's installed yet on your virtual hard disk) or install in a variety of methods. Hit the down arrow so "Install" is highlighted and hit the Enter key.

The screen will turn blue, churn for a bit, then black with a little clock. Be patient, it's working. Finally, you get to see a screen to begin your installation journey. On the first one, you get to select which language you want. Select your language of choice, and click next.
Next you are shown the license agreement. If you are hyped up on Jolt Cola and Double Espressos and need some sleep go ahead and read through it. Otherwise, click the "Yes I agree", then click next.
Now you are asked what mode you are doing the install in. Since this is a fresh machine the only valid option is New Installation. If there had been an older version of openSUSE on the machine you would also have the upgrade option. For now, take the default of New Installation and click Next.
The openSUSE installer will now do some System Analysis. It will read over your system and produce you a list of what it's going to install. It'll take a minute or two, so be patient.

On the next screen you are asked about the Time Zone. Pick the time zone you live in and press next.


Now comes your first difficult decision. openSUSE wants you to pick a default desktop. Unlike Windows, Linux will let you pick from a variety of desktop shells. The desktop defines the look and feel of what you see as you interact with the computer.

If you are a Windows user, you might be more comfortable with the KDE desktop. It has a start bar and "K" menu across the bottom. On the other hand Gnome has something more akin to a look and feel from the Mac line. There are others out there, but these are the top two.

There's one other item to take into consideration. If you intend to do any coding using Mono, you will need to use the Gnome desktop. The last time I checked, the majority of the Mono development tools were designed for the Gnome desktop. (I don't claim to be a Mono expert, so if this is incorrect please feel free to leave an enlightening comment.) Mono, by the way, is the open source implementation of the Microsoft .Net Framework. Using Mono you can write C# code for a Linux environment.

Don't stress over this too much. The nice thing about Linux is you can change your mind later, or you can try out a new desktop just to see what it's like without making a permanent change to your default desktop.

Since one day I hope to dabble in Mono, I will pick the Gnome desktop and click Next.


OK, getting close. Now openSUSE will show you an installation summary, with everything it's going to do and install. Give it a glance, and if you are happy with your options click Next.


This is where the folks at Novell like to play an April Fool joke, in that you only thought you were done with license agreements. In the 10.2 version I downloaded, I'm additionally asked to confirm the licenses for some Adobe product and the Flash player. I clicked OK on both.
OK, openSUSE asks you one last time if you are sure. We are (well at least I am) so click Install to begin the install.
Now sit back and wait. And wait. And wait some more. This thing takes a long time to install, for me the counter started at over 2 hours, although in the end it didn't take that long.

First you'll see some screens that talk about preparing your hard disk. Don't worry, it's the virtual disk it's formatting, you're safe. Finally you'll see this screen as it begins the process.


Over to the right you'll see the count down timer, and the center part will change during the install, giving you nice little tidbits and tricks. This would be a good time to refill your coffee, put some Jolt Cola on ice and order that pizza. You'll be sitting here a while. (While you're waiting might be a good time to explore some of my other posts, LOL.)

One real important thing: if your VirtualPC screen goes blank during the install, don't freak out! Believe it or not, the screen saver is actually active during the install. All you have to do is click inside the VirtualPC window. The screen will then update to show you where it's at in the install process.

After it's finally done, it will tell you it's going to reboot. Go ahead and let it, obviously. If you do nothing, the machine will reboot itself.

After the reboot you'll see the same screen you saw when you first started, assuming you didn't eject the openSUSE dvd. Pick the "Boot from Hard Disk" option, or if you do nothing it will take it as the default.

The next screen asks if you want the default of openSUSE 10.2, to boot off of Floppy, or the Failsafe mode for 10.2. Failsafe is kind of like Safe Mode under XP. Normally you'll pick the openSUSE 10.2 option, which is what we will do now. (Doing nothing by the way will automatically select this.)
After the system finally gets done rebooting, there are some final installation steps that need to take place. First, you are taken to a screen and asked what you want the root user password to be. This is the master password for the system, you need this to install software or do any serious maintenance. Enter something secure, but easy to remember. Most of all don't forget it, or your lovely Linux install will become severely handicapped. Enter your chosen password now, then click next.


Next you are prompted for a host name and domain name. Take the defaults and click Next.


In the next window you are asked about the network configuration. Be patient while openSUSE examines your virtual system. When done, just click Next to take the defaults it finds.


At the end of the network configuration, openSUSE wants to test your connection. Assuming you are connected to the web, leave Yes selected and click next to perform the test. Now, when I tried to do the test, it kept failing on me. I puzzled, fumed, changed things, but could find nothing wrong.

Finally, out of desperation, I clicked the Back button to return to the screen below, then told it to skip the test, and go on. By golly, it actually worked just fine! I guess the problem is on the Novell end, as openSUSE happily proceeded to download all sorts of online updates with no problems. Your experience may vary a little, but if you try the test and it fails, try using the Back button, tell it No, skip the test, and go on from there. I'm betting it'll work OK for you too.


The online update is next, here openSUSE will try to download the latest patches and what-not for your system. You have the option to skip by picking No, but I would suggest you let it run so you can have all the latest security updates and bug fixes. (Note if you are not hooked to the internet, or were unable to get the networking to work, you will want to skip this step.)

As the first step in the updates, you are asked about additional installation sources. For now, take the defaults as shown and tell it Yes, to register the checked sources.


You will now see a series of update screens flash by as your system is updated from the internet. The screen will look something like this:

Just let it go, it will take a bit (especially if you have a slow connection). When it's done openSUSE will automatically take you to the next area.


In this next area you are prompted for users. First, you are asked about the method for authenticating users. There are some nice options here, including the ability to check against a windows domain. For our purposes though, the default of Local (/etc/passwd) will do just fine, so click Next.
Next you are prompted for user info. Enter your name, what user name you'd like to have, and a password for that user. There's also a checkbox for Automatic Login. If you will be the only one using this VirtualPC, you can leave this checked on.

On the other hand, if you will be sharing this VPC with friends, you may wish to uncheck this. When you do so openSUSE will request you to login each time. One last note, you will want to make your password different from the one you entered for the root user. It's not a requirement, but it is a good idea. Once you have entered everything, click Next.


OK, now sit back and wait a few minutes, as openSUSE is going to finish setting up your user account, then is going to run some cleanup.
When the cleanup is done you are automatically shown the release notes. This describes changes and the like since the last version. Take a quick glance, and know that you can always pull these up later if you are in a hurry. Go ahead and click Next when you are done.
In this last step you are shown your hardware configuration and asked to confirm it's what you want to use. While it's examining your config your screen may switch back to a text display, then back to the graphical installer. This is normal behavior, just be aware of it.

When it's done examining, you'll be ready to click Next. Note one item, there have been some issues with openSUSE not detecting the sound card of Virtual PC 2007. If sound is extremely critical to you, consider sticking with either VPC 2004, or drop back to openSUSE 10.1.

I can wait for the sound issue to get fixed in a later patch, so I'll be clicking Next at this point.


You've hit the finish line! You installation is complete, all you have to do now is click the Finish button.


When you do, openSUSE will complete a few tasks, then 'reboot' your virtual system. This will take a few minutes, and when done you are logged in and ready to use your openSUSE Virtual PC.


Click on the "Computer" icon in the lower left, to begin exploring your openSUSE installation.
To get up and running with openSUSE I'd recommend a good podcast to you called Linux Reality. Chess Griffin is the host, and did a great three part tutorial on openSUSE at these links:

Part 1: http://www.linuxreality.com/podcast/episode-16-suse-linux-101-part-1/

Or: http://shrinkster.com/lxh

Part2: http://www.linuxreality.com/podcast/episode-17-suse-linux-101-part-2/

Or: http://shrinkster.com/lxi

Part 3: http://www.linuxreality.com/podcast/episode-18-suse-linux-101-part-3/

Or: http://shrinkster.com/lxj

His original tutorial was for 10.1, so there may be a few minor differences but not enough to make a difference.

There's also a support site for SUSE Linux you can find at http://wiki.suselinuxsupport.de/wikka.php?wakka=SuSELinuxSupport or http://shrinkster.com/lxk.

That's about it, one final note. As I tell my kids, when you are done playing make sure to put away your toys. To shut down your Virtual PC openSUSE, just select Logout from the Computer menu, and it will give you a screen with the standard Logout, Shutdown, etc. menu options. Just pick Shutdown and you are free to go get that cup of coffee you've been waiting for.

8 Responses to "Installing openSUSE 10.2 on Virtual PC Step by Step"

  1. Andreas Jaeger Says:

    Thanks for the fine step-by-step installation.

    I noticed that you had problems with the network connection test. I'm a bit surprised, this should really not happen and I don't remember seeing such a bug report. If you still have the yast logfiles, please open a bugreport as described on http://bugs.opensuse.org in our bugzilla and attach the YaST logfiles (see http://en.opensuse.org/Bugs/YaST#I_reported_a_YaST2_bug.2C_and_now_I_am_asked_to_.22attach_y2logs.22._What_does_that_mean.2C_and_how_do_I_do_that.3F)
    and give us some more details so that we can fix it for the future.

    thanks,
    Andreas

  2. Musings, Ramblings, and the Occasional Useful Information : OpenSuse 10.2 in Virtual PC 2007 Says:

    […] initial desktop. There is a great step-by-step (with pictures of the entire process) here: http://arcanecode.wordpress.com/2007/02/16/installing-opensuse-102-on-virtual-pc-step-by-step/. Installing updates (especially security updates) before first boot is a VERY good thing, as […]

  3. colmob Says:

    Did you try installing the Virtual Machine Additions by MS? I find on my machine that the clock goes totally out of whack, and the keyboard repeats keys, without them, but they will not install. I've found some cryptic comments by some MS employees about them being 'broken' by 10.2. Any ideas? Thanks!

  4. NickSchultz Says:

    microsoft has released a fix on how to fix the crazy clock… they describe the problem, what is causing it and finally howto fix it.

    It was very informative and fixed my problem

    http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=918461#

  5. bob Says:

    i *hart* linnix

  6. bob Says:

    why cant i get on the internet!!!!????!?!?!?!?!?!

  7. arcanecode Says:

    Bob,

    Click on Edit, Settings (if you are already running the VPC, if not just the settings for that VPC from the console). Go down to Network, and see what your network adapter is linked to. This area lets you like the virtual network adapter to one of the real ones in your computer.

    It could be something like you use wireless for all your internet, but VPC is hooking to the wired network card you have unplugged.

    Arcane

  8. Bram Says:

    Hello

    I tried getting Open SUSE 10.2 installed under VPC2007 but get stuck after the Installation option. VPC tells me to install the additions. I choose the right alt I menu option but nothing seems to happen. I am running XP sp2 prof. and the latest VPC software.

    Bram

Virtual PC Guy's WebLog Floppy disk image formats supported by Virtual PC and Virtual Server

Virtual PC and Virtual Server allow you to create and use 1.44MB (high density 3.5" media) and 720KB (double density 3.5" media) floppy disk images. However they also support a number of other formats. The supported formats are as follows:

Size: 360KB
Format: Single-density
Media type: 3.5"
Information: You probably are unfamiliar with this format. The only place that I've ever seen this used is on the old Apple Macintosh installation media.

Size: 720KB
Format: Double-density
Media type: 3.5"
Information: This is the standard "old" 3.5" floppy disk format.

Size: 1.2MB
Format: High-density
Media type: 5.25"
Information: This is the largest standard format that was supported on the old, flexible, 5.25" floppy disks.

Size: 1.44MB
Format: High-density
Media type: 3.5"
Information: For people who are still using floppy disks, this is probably what they're using.

Size: 1.68MB
Format: High-density - DMF
Media type: 3.5"
Information: DMF, or Distribution Media Format, was a format used by Microsoft to allow them to cram more data on to a standard floppy disk. It was used for the installation media for things like DOS, Windows 3.11 and Office 4.2.

Size: 1.72MB
Format: High-density - XDF
Media type: 3.5"
Information: XDF, or eXtended Density Format, was IBM's equivalent to DMF. It was used for OS/2 and PC-DOS. Interestingly enough it is not physically possible to read a XDF formatted floppy under Windows at all, so we only support the use of XDF floppy disk images (not physical disks).

You may come across floppy disk images that are already in these formats, in which case they will just work. Or you can make your own floppy disk images in these formats by using tools like WinImage (http://www.winimage.com).

Cheers,
Ben

Published Thursday, January 04, 2007 2:43 PM by Virtual PC Guy

Filed under: Virtual PC / Server Tips 'n' Tricks

Coding Horror Virtual PC 2004 tips

Virtual PC 2007 and Linux - microsoft.public.virtualpc Google Groups

On Sun, 18 Mar 2007 17:00:33 -0400, "William LaMartin"

<lamar...@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:

> I just finished downloading the five CD images for SuSE 10.0 and doing the
>installation. The installation seemed to go very well, and at some point it
>displayed that is was using the VESA driver at 16 bit color and 800x600
>resolution. There was a place to click to change this, and I changed the
>resolution to 1024x768.

>However, when Linux opened in Virtual PC it was only 800x600, and in the
>utility program to change screen resolutions, 800x600 was the one available.
>And at 800x600, I couldn't even see the bottom part of the screen to set up
>the evolution email program.

>I tried to go into the x configuration (which I know next to nothing about)
>and set the resolution. But the password I set up on installation was
>rejected, so that got nowhere.

>Of the three virtual machines I have tried to create for Linux
>distributions, only the Ubuntu one gave me more than 800x600 as a final
>result.

Make sure that you're setting the monitor to something other than
800x600 too. This will prevent you from going to a higher resolution.
The easiest route is to select a 1600x1200 (60hz) generic LCD. This
should let you get higher resolutions.

If you use the S3 drivers, the Linux drivers for the card limit it to
2MB which will prevent you from also getting higher resolutions. Using
the VESA driver allows you to assign 8MB to the card without a problem
and get higher resolutions.

--
Cheers,
Steve Jain, Virtual Machine MVP
http://vpc.essjae.com/

Universal TCP/IP boot disk

Tuesday, October 03, 2006, 5:09:00 PM | Virtual PC GuyGo to full article

I recently wanted to Ghost a physical computer to a virtual machine. This is usually best done with a TCP/IP boot disk that you can run in both locations, and by storing the Ghost image on a file server. Now, I have set this up in the past but I seemed to have misplaced my TCP/IP boot disk - and man are those things a pain to create.

Luckily a bit of looking around revealed this: http://www.netbootdisk.com/

This is a nice, free, tool that will take a plain DOS boot disk and turn it into a generic TCP/IP boot disk. It has a bunch of NIC drivers, and worked out of the box with booth my physical computer and my virtual machines. I just booted the floppy, set the username and password and seconds later was able to 'net use x: \\servername\share' from a DOS prompt with no problems.

Very nice indeed.

Cheers,
Ben

Repeating keys under Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Tuesday, August 08, 2006, 9:14:00 PM | Virtual PC GuyGo to full article
I recently ran into a case where I was seeing rapidly repeating keys under a Red Hat Enterprise Linux virtual machine. I was also contacted by one of the virtual machine MVPs who was seeing the same problem under Fedora.

After a bit of poking around it turned out that this was an extreme case of KB918461 (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=918461) "The system time runs too fast on a Linux-based virtual machine that is hosted in Virtual Server 2005 R2".

What is happening here is that the 2.6 kernel is using the TSC (time stamp counter) to provide a higher level of accuracy for time over just using the PIT (programmable interrupt timer). The problem is that the TSC is highly unreliable inside of a virtual machine - and this results in all sorts of timing oddities.

The resolution proposed by this KB is to configure Linux to just use the PIT for timing - which solved my problem nicely.

Cheers,
Ben

Updated Virtual Machine Additions for Linux now Available

Monday, April 02, 2007, 9:09:00 PM | Virtual PC Guy

Well, Andrew Dugdell beat me to posting about this, but an updated version of the Virtual Machine Additions for Linux is now available for download. With this version the following distributions of Linux are supported:

You can download these Additions from Microsoft Connect. Note - while the Virtual Machine Additions are only available on Connect - they are not Beta, but are final release versions and are fully supported.

How to get the mouse working with Ubuntu 7.04 under Virtual PC

Wednesday, May 30, 2007, 7:53:42 PM | Virtual PC Guy

I know a lot of people have been trying to get Ubuntu 7.04 working under Virtual PC - and have been hitting the problem that the mouse does not work. Well - details of how to get the mouse working have now been posted here:

http://arcanecode.wordpress.com/2007/05/17/fixing-ubuntu-704-fiesty-fawn-mouse-under-virtual-pc-2007/

Have fun!

Cheers,
Ben

# re: How to get the mouse working with Ubuntu 7.04 under Virtual PC

A more scalable approach, one that survives updates, is to simply use the boot parameter

"i8042.noloop". I describe how to do this on my blog, link below. The patch also works on the default release LiveCD, but will not work if you upgrade the kernel to fix other bugs.

Setting the boot paramter just skips the whole issue.

http://www.nettakeaway.com/tp/article/294/ubuntu-704-and-no-mouse-on-virtual-pc

Virtual PC Guy's WebLog One million downloads of Virtual PC 2007!

Wednesday, April 11, 2007 6:10 PM by

# re: One million downloads of Virtual PC 2007!

I needed to install SuSE SLES10 in a VPC VM on my Win 2003 Standard system. I recalled the problems with VPC 2004 last time I tried this with a 4GB DVD image, so I performed a VPC 2007 upgrade install first, hoping things would go more smoothly.

The image appeared to mount successfully, BUT I still had problems with the SuSE install. I had to use the same workaround as the previous experience, Virtual CD mount on the host OS, then attach to the physical DVD in VPC.

I thought the 2.2 GB issue was supposed to be resolved in VPC 2007. What happened? This is the release version of VPC 2007.

NewsForge Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 lags behind competition

VPC's interface is pretty simple and straightforward. You can choose to go through a detailed procedure to create a virtual machine, or let VPC create one for you. The "Use default settings to create a virtual machine" option creates a useless VM with 128 MB RAM and no hard disk.

My test computer has the Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 processor with the IVT virtualization extension. VPC 2007 supports IVT for improving performance. For the test I created a guest with 512MB RAM and a 6GB hard disk with pre-allocated space to reduce over-head.

The first distribution I tried was Knoppix 5.0. Boot up and hardware recognition went fine, and I was at the KDE desktop in less than 20 seconds after powering up the machine. Impressed, I fired up OpenOffice.org 2.0, which loaded up in a matter of seconds. The guest system plugged into my network through a bridged connection, got its own IP address and networking worked seamlessly. Next in line was the latest FreeBSD-based live CD, FreeSBIE 2.0 -- which, like Knoppix, worked like a charm.

Satisfied with the performance of the live CDs, I decided to test some installable distributions. First up was Ubuntu 6.10, which is installable via its live CD environment. VPC 2007 had trouble displaying the Ubuntu desktop. A quick Google search led me to the Ubuntu Wiki which has a page on

Basically, I had to modify my X server's configuration file to change the default display depth to 16 bits instead of the default of 24.

... ... ...

Ubuntu and Pardus took about the same time to boot that they do on a similar VMware virtual machine. Even when inside the distribution, there isn't any noticeable difference between application launch times. For example, OpenOffice.org 2.0 takes less than 10 seconds. I wouldn't get this performance if there were issues with the virtual hardware. To top it all, the VPC 2007 virtual machines were stable and none of them crashed.

...it lacks support for USB storage devices. Even guest Windows OSes will not be able to use USB drives. This is extremely irritating since VPC doesn't allow drag-and-drop of data between the host Windows and Linux guests. Microsoft does offer an add-on package called Virtual PC Additions, which is similar to VMware's VMtools package, which allows file transfer between the host and Windows guests.

Microsoft Virtual PC - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Although installing a Linux-Based environment is possible, the guest operating system will need to be installed in text mode due to the limitation that Microsoft Virtual PC emulates a video in 16-bit or 32-bit color depth. In order to run an X Window user interface, the guest operating system will need to have xorg.conf edited to 16-bit in order to comply with this limitation.[1]

The Developer's Guide to Building Virtual PCs

Walk through a step-by-step Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 installation of SuSE Linux 9.1 Professional. Once it's built, you can clone your Virtual PC, ...

Virtual PC Guy's WebLog Linux is now supported under Virtual Server

What Works and What Doesn't in Microsoft Virtual PC 2004

Installing Linux on Virtual PC

Installing Linux on Virtual PC

In my pursuits to rid myself of the Microsoft beast, I've added a book to my collection (Setting up LAMP: Getting Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP Working Together), and decided to install Fedora Core 4 on a virtual machine, using Microsoft's Virtual PC.

I've used Virtual PC in the past with no problems, but this was my first foray into using it to run a non-Microsoft operating system. It was intriguing, to say the least...

In searching for a solution, I stumbled across What Works and What Doesn't in Microsoft Virtual PC 2004, which turned out to be a valuable resource of information, even though none of the suggested solutions worked. What did work (and I submitted this tip to the operator of the aforementioned Web site, Jonathan Maltz) is the following, which essentially tells Linux to boot into text mode instead of GUI mode (i.e. X Windows). I haven't tried messing with X further on this installation, but will post more notes when I do.

Recommended Links

Google matched content

Softpanorama Recommended

Top articles

Sites

Etc

Cooperative Linux

Cooperative Linux is the first working free and open source method for optimally running Linux on Microsoft Windows natively. More generally, Cooperative Linux (short-named coLinux) is a port of the Linux kernel that allows it to run cooperatively alongside another operating system on a single machine. For instance, it allows one to freely run Linux on Windows 2000/XP, without using a commercial PC virtualization software such as VMware, in a way which is much more optimal than using any general purpose PC virtualization software. In its current condition, it allows us to run the KNOPPIX Japanese Edition on Windows (see Screenshots).



Etc

Society

Groupthink : Two Party System as Polyarchy : Corruption of Regulators : Bureaucracies : Understanding Micromanagers and Control Freaks : Toxic Managers :   Harvard Mafia : Diplomatic Communication : Surviving a Bad Performance Review : Insufficient Retirement Funds as Immanent Problem of Neoliberal Regime : PseudoScience : Who Rules America : Neoliberalism  : The Iron Law of Oligarchy : Libertarian Philosophy

Quotes

War and Peace : Skeptical Finance : John Kenneth Galbraith :Talleyrand : Oscar Wilde : Otto Von Bismarck : Keynes : George Carlin : Skeptics : Propaganda  : SE quotes : Language Design and Programming Quotes : Random IT-related quotesSomerset Maugham : Marcus Aurelius : Kurt Vonnegut : Eric Hoffer : Winston Churchill : Napoleon Bonaparte : Ambrose BierceBernard Shaw : Mark Twain Quotes

Bulletin:

Vol 25, No.12 (December, 2013) Rational Fools vs. Efficient Crooks The efficient markets hypothesis : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2013 : Unemployment Bulletin, 2010 :  Vol 23, No.10 (October, 2011) An observation about corporate security departments : Slightly Skeptical Euromaydan Chronicles, June 2014 : Greenspan legacy bulletin, 2008 : Vol 25, No.10 (October, 2013) Cryptolocker Trojan (Win32/Crilock.A) : Vol 25, No.08 (August, 2013) Cloud providers as intelligence collection hubs : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : Inequality Bulletin, 2009 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Copyleft Problems Bulletin, 2004 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Energy Bulletin, 2010 : Malware Protection Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 26, No.1 (January, 2013) Object-Oriented Cult : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2011 : Vol 23, No.11 (November, 2011) Softpanorama classification of sysadmin horror stories : Vol 25, No.05 (May, 2013) Corporate bullshit as a communication method  : Vol 25, No.06 (June, 2013) A Note on the Relationship of Brooks Law and Conway Law

History:

Fifty glorious years (1950-2000): the triumph of the US computer engineering : Donald Knuth : TAoCP and its Influence of Computer Science : Richard Stallman : Linus Torvalds  : Larry Wall  : John K. Ousterhout : CTSS : Multix OS Unix History : Unix shell history : VI editor : History of pipes concept : Solaris : MS DOSProgramming Languages History : PL/1 : Simula 67 : C : History of GCC developmentScripting Languages : Perl history   : OS History : Mail : DNS : SSH : CPU Instruction Sets : SPARC systems 1987-2006 : Norton Commander : Norton Utilities : Norton Ghost : Frontpage history : Malware Defense History : GNU Screen : OSS early history

Classic books:

The Peter Principle : Parkinson Law : 1984 : The Mythical Man-MonthHow to Solve It by George Polya : The Art of Computer Programming : The Elements of Programming Style : The Unix Hater’s Handbook : The Jargon file : The True Believer : Programming Pearls : The Good Soldier Svejk : The Power Elite

Most popular humor pages:

Manifest of the Softpanorama IT Slacker Society : Ten Commandments of the IT Slackers Society : Computer Humor Collection : BSD Logo Story : The Cuckoo's Egg : IT Slang : C++ Humor : ARE YOU A BBS ADDICT? : The Perl Purity Test : Object oriented programmers of all nations : Financial Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : The Most Comprehensive Collection of Editor-related Humor : Programming Language Humor : Goldman Sachs related humor : Greenspan humor : C Humor : Scripting Humor : Real Programmers Humor : Web Humor : GPL-related Humor : OFM Humor : Politically Incorrect Humor : IDS Humor : "Linux Sucks" Humor : Russian Musical Humor : Best Russian Programmer Humor : Microsoft plans to buy Catholic Church : Richard Stallman Related Humor : Admin Humor : Perl-related Humor : Linus Torvalds Related humor : PseudoScience Related Humor : Networking Humor : Shell Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2012 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2013 : Java Humor : Software Engineering Humor : Sun Solaris Related Humor : Education Humor : IBM Humor : Assembler-related Humor : VIM Humor : Computer Viruses Humor : Bright tomorrow is rescheduled to a day after tomorrow : Classic Computer Humor

The Last but not Least Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt. Ph.D


Copyright © 1996-2021 by Softpanorama Society. www.softpanorama.org was initially created as a service to the (now defunct) UN Sustainable Development Networking Programme (SDNP) without any remuneration. This document is an industrial compilation designed and created exclusively for educational use and is distributed under the Softpanorama Content License. Original materials copyright belong to respective owners. Quotes are made for educational purposes only in compliance with the fair use doctrine.

FAIR USE NOTICE This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to advance understanding of computer science, IT technology, economic, scientific, and social issues. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided by section 107 of the US Copyright Law according to which such material can be distributed without profit exclusively for research and educational purposes.

This is a Spartan WHYFF (We Help You For Free) site written by people for whom English is not a native language. Grammar and spelling errors should be expected. The site contain some broken links as it develops like a living tree...

You can use PayPal to to buy a cup of coffee for authors of this site

Disclaimer:

The statements, views and opinions presented on this web page are those of the author (or referenced source) and are not endorsed by, nor do they necessarily reflect, the opinions of the Softpanorama society. We do not warrant the correctness of the information provided or its fitness for any purpose. The site uses AdSense so you need to be aware of Google privacy policy. You you do not want to be tracked by Google please disable Javascript for this site. This site is perfectly usable without Javascript.

Last modified: March 12, 2019