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DOwnload VirtualBox 3.0.10.54097 – 68.98MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.10.54097 Information

VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

VirtualBox 3.0.10.54097 Change Log
- VMM: guest SMP stability fixes
- VMM: fixed guru meditation with nested paging and SMP guests (bug #5222)
- VMM: changed VT-x/AMD-V usage to detect other active hypervisors; necessary for e.g. Windows 7 XP compatibility mode (Windows & Mac OS X hosts only; bug #4239)
- VMM: guru meditation during SCO OpenServer installation and reboot (VT-x only; bug #5164)
- VMM: fixed accessed bit handling in certain cases (bug #5248)
- VMM: fixed VPID flushing (VT-x only)
- VMM: fixed broken nested paging for 64 bits guests on 32 bits hosts (AMD-V only; bug #5285)
- VMM: fixed loading of old saved states/snapshots (bug #3984)
- Mac OS X hosts: fixed memory leaks (bug #5084)
- Mac OS X hosts (Snow Leopard): fixed redraw problem in a dual screen setup (bug #4942)
- Windows hosts: installer updates for Windows 7
- Solaris hosts: out of memory handled incorrectly (bug #5241)
- Solaris hosts: the previous fix for #5077 broke the DVD host support on Solaris 10 (VBox 3.0.8 regression)
- Linux hosts: fixed module compilation against Linux 2.6.32rc4 and later
- Guest Additions: fixed possible guest OS kernel memory exhaustion
- Guest Additions: fixed stability issues with SMP guests
- Windows Additions: fixed color depth issue with low resolution hosts, netbooks, etc. (bug #4935)
- Windows Additions: fixed NO_MORE_FILES error when saving to shared folders (bug #4106)
- Windows Additions: fixed subdirectory creation on shared folders (bug #4299)
- Linux Additions: sendfile() returned -EOVERFLOW when executed on a shared folder (bug #2921)
- Linux Additions: fixed incorrect disk usage value (non-Windows hosts only)
- Linux installer: register the module sources at DKMS even if the package provides proper modules for the current running kernel
- 3D support: removed invalid OpenGL assertion (bug #5158)
- Network: fixed the Am79C973 PCNet emulation for QNX (and probably other) guests (bug #3206)
- VMDK: fix handling of split image variants
- VHD: do not delay updating the footer when expanding the image to prevent image inconsistency
- USB: stability fix for some USB 2.0 devices
- GUI: added a search index to the .chm help file
- GUI/Windows hosts: fixed CapsLock handling on French keyboards (bug #2025)
- Shared clipboard/X11 hosts: fixed a crash when clipboard initialisation failed (bug #4987)

DOwnload VirtualBox 3.0.10.54097

Download VirtualBox 3.0.10.54077 – 68.97MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.10.54077 Information

VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

VirtualBox 3.0.10.54077 Change Log
* VMM: guest SMP stability fixes
* VMM: fixed guru meditation with nested paging and SMP guests (bug #5222)
* VMM: changed VT-x/AMD-V usage to detect other active hypervisors; necessary for e.g. Windows 7 XP compatibility mode (Windows & Mac OS X hosts only; bug #4239)
* VMM: guru meditation during SCO OpenServer installation and reboot (VT-x only; bug #5164)
* VMM: fixed accessed bit handling in certain cases (bug #5248)
* VMM: fixed VPID flushing (VT-x only)
* VMM: fixed broken nested paging for 64 bits guests on 32 bits hosts (AMD-V only; bug #5285)
* VMM: fixed loading of old saved states/snapshots (bug #3984)
* Mac OS X hosts: fixed memory leaks (bug #5084)
* Mac OS X hosts (Snow Leopard): fixed redraw problem in a dual screen setup (bug #4942)
* Windows hosts: installer updates for Windows 7
* Windows hosts: fixed blue screen when using certain USB devices (bug #5129)
* Solaris hosts: out of memory handled incorrectly (bug #5241)
* Solaris hosts: the previous fix for #5077 broke the DVD host support on Solaris 10 (VBox 3.0.8 regression)
* Linux hosts: fixed module compilation against Linux 2.6.32rc4 and later
* Guest Additions: fixed possible guest OS kernel memory exhaustion
* Guest Additions: fixed stability issues with SMP guests
* Windows Additions: fixed color depth issue with low resolution hosts, netbooks, etc. (bug #4935)
* Windows Additions: fixed NO_MORE_FILES error when saving to shared folders (bug #4106)
* Windows Additions: fixed subdirectory creation on shared folders (bug #4299)
* Linux Additions: sendfile() returned -EOVERFLOW when executed on a shared folder (bug #2921)
* Linux Additions: fixed incorrect disk usage value (non-Windows hosts only)
* Linux installer: register the module sources at DKMS even if the package provides proper modules for the current running kernel
* 3D support: removed invalid OpenGL assertion (bug #5158)
* Network: fixed the Am79C973 PCNet emulation for QNX (and probably other) guests (bug #3206)
* VMDK: fix handling of split image variants
* VHD: do not delay updating the footer when expanding the image to prevent image inconsistency
* USB: stability fix for some USB 2.0 devices
* GUI: added a search index to the .chm help file
* GUI/Windows hosts: fixed CapsLock handling on French keyboards (bug #2025)
* Shared clipboard/X11 hosts: fixed a crash when clipboard initialisation failed (bug #4987)

Download VirtualBox 3.0.10.54077

Download VirtualBox 3.0.6 Beta1 – 68.32MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.6 Beta1 Information
VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

VirtualBox 3.0.6 Beta1 Change Log
* VMM: fixed IO-APIC overhead for 32 bits Windows NT, 2000, XP and 2003 guests (AMD-V only; bug #4392)
* VMM: fixed a Guru meditation under certain circumstances when enabling a disabled device (bug #4510)
* VMM: fixed a Guru meditation when booting certain Arch Linux guests (software virtualization only; bug #2149)
* VMM: fixed hangs with 64 bits Solaris & OpenSolaris guests (bug #2258)
* VMM: fixed decreasing rdtsc values (AMD-V & VT-x only; bug #2869)
* VMM: small Solaris/OpenSolaris performance improvements (VT-x only)
* VMM: cpuid change to correct reported virtual CPU id in Linux
* VMM: NetBSD 5.0.1 CD hangs during boot (VT-x only; bug #3947)
* Solaris hosts: fixed a potential host system deadlock when CPUs were onlined or offlined
* Python WS: fixed issue with certain enumerations constants having wrong value in Python webservices bindings
* Python API: several threading and platform issues fixed
* Python shell: added exportVM command
* Python shell: improvments and bugfixes
* Python shell: corrected detection of home directory in remote case
* OVF: fixed XML comment handling that could lead to parser errors
* Main: fixed a rare parsing problem with port numbers of USB device filters in machine settings XML
* Main: restrict guest RAM size to 1.5 GB (32 bits Windows hosts only)
* GUI: fixed rare crash when removing the last disk from the media manager (bug #4795)
* Linux hosts: don’t crash on Linux PAE kernel < 2.6.11 (in particular RHEL/CentOS 4); disable VT-x on Linux kernels < 2.6.13 (bug #1842)
* Linux/Solaris hosts: correctly detect keyboards with less keys than usual (bug #4799)
* Serial: fixed host mode (Solaris, Linux and Mac OS X hosts; bug #4672)
* VRDP: Remote USB Protocol version 3
* SATA: fixed hangs and BSODs introduced with 3.0.4 (#4695, #4739, #4710)
* SATA: fixed a bug which prevented Windows 7 from detecting more than one hard disk
* iSCSI: fix logging out when the target has dropped the connection, fix negotiation of simparameters, fix command resend when the connection was dropped, fix processing SCSI status for targets which do not use phase collapse
* BIOS: fixed a bug preventing to start the OS/2 boot manager (2.1.0 regression, bug #3911)
* PulseAudio: don't hang during VM termination if the connection to the server was unexpectedly terminated (bug #3100)
* Mouse: fixed weird mouse behaviour with SMP (Solaris) guests
* HostOnly Network: fixed failure in CreateHostOnlyNetworkInterface() on Linux (no GUID)
* HostOnly Network: fixed wrong DHCP server startup while hostonly interface bringup on Linux
* HostOnly Network: fixed incorrect factory and default MAC address on Solaris
* DHCP: fixed a bug in the DHCP server where it allocated one IP address less than the configured range
* E1000: fixed receiving of multicast packets
* E1000: fixed up/down link notification after resuming a VM
* NAT: fixed ethernet address corruptions (bug #4839)
* NAT: fixed hangs, dropped packets and retransmission problems (bug #4343)
* Bridged Network: fixed packet queue issue which might cause DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE bsod for windows hosts (bug #4821)
* Windows Additions: fixed a bug in VBoxGINA which prevented selecting the right domain when logging in the first time
* Windows host installer: should now also work on unicode systems (like Korean, bug #3707)
* Shared clipboard: do not send zero-terminated text to X11 guests and hosts (bug #4712)
* Shared clipboard: use a less CPU intensive way of checking for new data on X11 guests and hosts (bug #4092)
* Mac OS X hosts: prevent password dialogs in 32Bit Snow Leopard
* Solaris hosts: worked around an issue that caused the host to hang (bug #4486)
* Guest Additions: do not hide the host mouse cursor when restoring a saved state (bug #4700)
* Windows guests: fixed issues with the display of the mouse cursor image (bugs #2603, #2660 and #4817)
* SUSE 11 guests: fixed Guest Additions installation (bug #4506)
* Guest Additions: support Fedora 12 Alpha guests (bugs #4731, #4733 and #4734)

Download VirtualBox 3.0.6 Beta1

Download VirtualBox 3.0.4 – 67.90MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.4 Information
VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

VirtualBox 3.0.4 Change Log
* VMM: 64 bits guest stability fixes (AMD-V only; bugs #3923 & #3666)
* VMM: SMP stability fixes (AMD-V only)
* VMM: SMP performance improvement (esp. for Solaris guests)
* VMM: eliminated several bugs which could lead to a host reboot
* VMM: fixed OS/2 ACP2 boot floppy hang (VT-x only)
* VMM: small performance improvement for OpenSolaris guests (AMD-V only)
* VMM: fixed CentOS/Xen reboot (software virtualization only; bug #4509)
* SATA: fixed hangs / BSOD during Windows XP installation (bug #4342)
* SATA: mark the ports as non hotpluggable (bug #3920)
* 3D support: fix deadlocks and context/window tracking for multithreaded applications (bug #3922)
* 3D support: fix memory leaks when terminating OpenGL guest applications
* 3D support: fix crash in Call of Duty
* NAT: using two or more NAT adapters in one VM was broken (3.0.0 regression)
* NAT: fixed network communication corruptions (bugs #4499, #4540, #4591, #4604)
* NAT: fixed passive ftp access to host server (bug #4427)
* iSCSI: fixed cloning to/from iSCSI disks
* GUI: fixed path separator handling for the OVF export on Windows (bug #4354)
* GUI: the mini toolbar was only shown on the first host display (bug #4654)
* GUI: added a VM option to display the mini toolbar on top
* GUI: don’t crash when adding plus configuring host-only network interfaces
* Shared Folders: fixed selection of a drive root directory as a shared folder host path in VirtualBox (Windows host only)
* USB: fixed a bug that may have rendered USB devicefilter settings inactive (3.0.2 regression, bug #4668)
* Guest Additions: report the Guest Additions version to the guest properties (bug #3415)
* Mac OS X hosts: fix creation of VMDK files giving raw partition access (bug #1461)
* Mac OS X hosts: improved support for Snow Leopard
* Linux hosts: fixed problems leading to wrong colors or transparency in host windows with some graphics drivers (bug #3095)
* Linux hosts: hardware detection fallbacks if the hal service fails to find any DVD drives.
* Linux and Solaris hosts: Work around color handling problems in Qt (bug #4353)
* Solaris hosts: fixed memory leaks in host-only networking
* Solaris Installer: fixed incorrect netmask for Host-only interface (bug #4590)
* Solaris Installer: added package dependency for Python and Python-devel (bug #4570)
* X11 guests: prevent windows from being skipped in seamless mode KDE guests (bugs #1681 and #3574)
* X11 guests: fixed screen corruption in X11 guests when large amounts of video RAM were allocated (bug #4430)
* X11 guests: some fixes when switching between host and guest-drawn mouse pointers.
* X11 guests: fixed an issue which caused seamless mode to stop working as it should (the main issue listed in bug #2238).

Download VirtualBox 3.0.2 – 67.88MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.2 Change Log
* VMM: fixed network regressions (guest hangs during network IO) (bug #4343)
* VMM: guest SMP performance improvements
* VMM: fixed hangs and poor performance with Kaspersky Internet Security (VT-x/AMD-V only; bug #1778)
* VMM: fixed crashes when executing certain Linux guests (software virtualization only; bugs #2696 & #3868)
* ACPI: fixed Windows 2000 kernel hangs with IO-APIC enabled (bug #4348)
* APIC: fixed high idle load for certain Linux guests (3.0 regression)
* BIOS: properly handle Ctrl-Alt-Del in real mode
* iSCSI: fixed configuration parsing (bug #4236)
* OVF: fix potential confusion when exporting networks
* OVF: compatibility fix (bug #4452)
* NAT: fixed crashes under certain circumstances (bug #4330)
* 3D support: fixed dynamic linking on Solaris/OpenSolaris guests (bug #4399)
* 3D support: fixed incorrect context/window tracking for multithreaded apps
* Shared Folders: fixed loading from saved state (bug #1595)
* Shared Folders: host file permissions set to 0400 with Windows guest (bug #4381)
* X11 host and guest clipboard: fixed a number of issues, including bug #4380 and #4344
* X11 Additions: fixed some issues with seamless windows in X11 guests (bug #3727)
* Windows Additions: added VBoxServiceNT for NT4 guests (for time synchronization and guest properties)
* Windows Additions: fixed version lookup
* Linux hosts: workaround for buggy graphics drivers showing a black VM window on recent distributions (bug #4335)
* Linux hosts: fixed typo in kernel module startup script (bug #4388)
* Installer: support Pardus Linux
* Solaris hosts: several installer fixes
* Solaris host: fixed a preemption issue causing VMs to never start on Solaris 10 (bug #4328).
* Solaris guest: fixed mouse integration for OpenSolaris 2009.06 (bug #4365)
* Windows hosts: fixed high CPU usage after resuming the host (bug #2978)
* OVF: accept ovf:/disk/ specifiers with a single slash in addition to ovf://disk/ (bug #4452)
* Fixed a settings file conversion bug which sometimes caused hardware acceleration to be enabled for virtual machines that had no explicit configuration in the XML.

VirtualBox 3.0.2 Information
VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

Download VirtualBox 3.0.0 – 67.48MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.0 Change Log
This version is a major update. The following major new features were added:

* Guest SMP with up to 32 virtual CPUs (VT-x and AMD-V only; see chapter 3.7.2.2 of the user manual)
* Windows guests: ability to use Direct3D 8/9 applications / games (experimental; see chapter 4.8 of the user manual)
* Support for OpenGL 2.0 for Windows, Linux and Solaris guests

In addition, the following items were ?xed and/or added:

* Solaris hosts: allow suspend/resume on the host when a VM is running (bug #3826)
* Solaris hosts: loosen the restriction for contiguous physical memory under certain conditions
* Mac OS X hosts: ?xed guest PAE
* Linux hosts: kernel module compile ?xes for 2.6.31 (bug #4264)
* VMM: ?xed occasional guru meditation when loading a saved state (VT-x only)
* VMM: eliminated IO-APIC overhead with 32 bits guests (VT-x only, some Intel CPUs don’t support this feature (most do); bug #638)
* VMM: ?xed 64 bits CentOS guest hangs during early boot (AMD-V only; bug #3927)
* VMM: performance improvements for certain PAE guests (e.g. Linux 2.6.29+ kernels)
* VMM: some Windows guests detected a completely wrong CPU frequency (bug #2227)
* VMM: ?xed hanging and unkillable VM processes (bug #4040)
* VMM: ?xed random infrequent guest crashes due to XMM state corruption (Win64 hosts only)
* VMM: performance improvements for network I/O (VT-x/AMD-V only)
* GUI: added mini toolbar for fullscreen and seamless mode (Thanks to Huihong Luo)
* GUI: redesigned settings dialogs
* GUI: allow to create/remove more than one host-only network adapters (non Windows hosts)
* GUI: display estimated time for long running operations (e.g. OVF import/export)
* GUI: ?xed rare hangs when open the OVF import/export wizards (bug #4157)
* 3D support: ?xed VM crashes for client applications using incorrect OpenGL states
* 3D support: ?xed memory corruption when querying for supported texture compression formats
* 3D support: ?xed incorrect rendering of glDrawRangeElements
* 3D support: ?xed memory leak when using VBOs
* 3D support: ?xed glew library detection
* 3D support: ?xed random textures corruption
* VRDP: support Windows 7 RDP client
* Networking: ?xed another problem with TX checksum of?oading with Linux kernels up to version 2.6.18
* NAT: ?xed “open ports on virtual router 10.0.2.2 – 513, 514” (forum)
* NAT: allow to con?gure socket and internal parameters
* NAT: allow to bind sockets to speci?c interface
* PXE boot: signi?cant performance increase (VT-x/AMD-V only)
* VHD: properly write empty sectors when cloning of VHD images (bug #4080)
* VHD: ?xed crash when discarding snapshots of a VHD image
* VHD: ?xed access beyond the block bitmap which could lead to arbitrary crashes
* VBoxManage: ?xed incorrect partition table processing when creating VMDK ?les giving raw partition access (bug #3510)
* VBoxManage: support cloning to existing image ?le
* OVF: several OVF 1.0 compatibility ?xes
* OVF: ?xed exporting of disk images when multiple virtual machines are exported at once
* Virtual mouse device: eliminated micro-movements of the virtual mouse which were confusing some applications (bug #3782)
* Shared Folders: sometimes a ?le was created using the wrong permissions (2.2.0 regression; bug #3785)
* Shared Folders: allow to change ?le attributes from Linux guests and use the correct ?le mode when creating ?les
* Shared Folders: some content was incorrectly written under certain conditions (bug #1187)
* Shared Folders: ?xed incorrect ?le timestamps, when using Windows guest on a Linux host (bug #3404)
* X11 clipboard: ?x duplicate end of lines (bug #4270)
* X11 guests: a number of shared clipboard ?xes
* Linux guests: Guest Additions support for SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11
* Linux guests: new daemon vboxadd-service to handle time synchronization and guest property lookup
* Linux guests: implemented guest properties (OS info, logged in users, basic network information)
* Windows host installer: VirtualBox Python API can now be installed automatically (requires Python and Win32 Extensions installed)
* USB: Support for high-speed isochronous endpoints has been added. In addition, read-ahead buffering is performed for input endpoints (currently Linux hosts only). This should allow additional devices to work, notably webcams (bug #242).
* USB: ?xed error handling for some USB dongles
* Web service: ?xed inability to handle NULL pointers for object arguments, which are valid values for a lot of APIs, in both the raw and the object-oriented web service.
* Web service: object-oriented bindings for JAX-WS did not exhibit interface inheritance correctly, ?xed
* Web service: added support for IDisplay and IGuest interfaces, which were previously unavailable
* Registration dialog uses Sun Online accounts now

VirtualBox 3.0.0 Information
VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

Download VirtualBox 3.0.0 Beta1 – 66.38MB (Open Source)

VirtualBox 3.0.0 Beta1 Information

VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.
* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

In my last two articles (Installing Windows XP as a Virtual Machine on VirtualBox and Installing and configuring VirtualBox for virtual OSes) you saw how easy it was to install VirtualBox and then install Windows XP as a virtual machine. The implications of this software are only as limited as the imagination of the user. But there are instances where the install might not look or feel exactly as you would like.

In my default setup of Windows XP, on my particular Ubuntu 9.04 box, the installation of Windows XP rendered a perfectly usable desktop with 32 bit colors in 800×600 resolution. This resolution, of course, is not ideal for some situations (such as Full Screen mode). In order to get a higher resolution, along with other features, you have to install Guest Additions. This is a simple process that can be done quickly and yields a much better user experience than the default. So…let’s get to the installation.

Figure 1

Before you attempt to do the installation of the guest additions you have to have your virtual machine up and running. Once that VM is running you will see three menu entries at the top of the window: Machine, Devices, and Help. You want to click on the Devices entry and then click the Install Guest Additions entry (see Figure 1).

What you will see is a warning message instructing you that the Guest Additions CD image could not be found. Fear not, this is normal. Click Yes in order to download the image and then Download to confirm. You will see a progress bar at the bottom left of your VM window.

When that download has finished you will be asked if you want to Mount the image. Click the Mount button to reveal the Sun xVM setup wizard. Click Next in the welcome screen which will take you to the license agreement window. Click the I Agree button (and read the license if you feel so inclined.)

Figure 2

What you are now doing is a fairly straightforward Windows application-like installation. The only “gotcha” during installation will be a warning that the software did not pass the Windows Logo testing. Ignore this warning and click Continue Anyway. Your screen will flicker for a second – don’t worry.

You will see this warning another time when it attempts to install software for the pointing devices.

After that warning the installation will complete and, in typical Windows fashion, you will be required to reboot your virtual machine. Do this. When the reboot completes you will find your virtual machine much easier to work with. Now:

* You no longer have to capture the mouse pointer.
* You can set your resolution to a much higher level.
* You can now copy and paste between guest and host operating systems.
* You can run Windows in seamless mode.

Seamless mode

Figure 3

Seamless mode is a very interesting trick. What this does is take the elements of Windows out of the VM window and layer them on top of your Linux desktop.

As you can see, in Figure 3, with seamless mode activated all Windows applications have their own window. So in this instance Internet Explorer appears to be running on Linux by itself. And the Windows task bar is resting nicely on top of the GNOME panel.

You toggle between seamless and non-seamless mode by pressing the Hot Key and the “L” key. The default Hot Key is the right Ctrl key.

Final thoughts

This is truly some exciting work. With the help of VirtualBox you can, effectively, have your cake and eat it too (as the saying goes.) Work with Windows applications inside of Linux without needing the help of Wine.
No tag for this post.

In my last article (Installing and configuring VirtualBox for virtual OSes) I walked you through the installation of the VirtualBox virtual machine tool. In this article I am going to show you how to actually install an operating system with this tool. You will be surprised at not only how simple the installation is, but how much better hardware detection is. In fact, as you will witness in the sample installation we will do, no hardware drivers are necessary. Believe it or not, Windows XP will work right out of the box.

Now I am using the open source version of VirtualBox so no USB support is included. Outside of that – everything should work exactly as expected.

Figure 1

Before you actually read this article make sure you have read through the first article and have VirtualBox installed.Once installed you can fire up VirtualBox and you will see a window similar to that in Figure 1. The only difference being that in my example there is already a virtual machine installed. And even though the currently installed VM is Windows XP, we can still install another XP instance. You can have as many instances of a single OS as you want so long as you have the room for it.

With that said, let’s begin the process.

The first thing to do is to click the New button which will start up the Wizard. This wizard, just like the setup wizard shown in the original article, is very user-friendly and makes for installing a virtual machine a breeze.

The first screen is just a welcome screen – click the Next button to move on to the first real interactive screen.

Figure 2

OS Name/Type

The first screen (shown in Figure 2) will require you to give the VM a name and select the operating system. Since I already have a VM called Windows XP I will name this new version something different.

After you have configured the name and the OS type click the Next button to move on.

Virtual Memory

The next screen requires you to select the amount of memory you want to dedicate to your Virtual Machine. Use caution with this setting. You have to still have enough memory left for your host operating system to run. By default VirtualBox will offer you the minimum required to run the virtual machine. This is fine if you don’t plan on doing much with the VM. If, however, you plan on running particular applications that are memory intensive, you should bump up the virtual memory a bit.

Hard Drive

This next screen was explained in detail in the original article – refer back to that for details. Once you have finished that section, you are ready to finalize your virtual machine and begin installation. Click Finish and you’re ready.

Powering it on

Now put your OS cd into the CD drive, select the virtual machine you want to use, and click the Start button. The first thing you will see is an information box instructing you how to capture and rekease your cursor. This is important to know, otherwise you will find yourself not being able to use your mouse outside of VirtualBox. To capture the cursor in VirtualBox you just click the mouse inside of the machine window. To release the cursor you hit the Ctrl key on the right side of your keyboard. That’s it. Click through that warning and you’re ready to rock.

Figure 3

What happens now is pretty much a standard installation of Windows. This will generally take about the same amount of time a normal installation will take. When you are finished you will have a working install of Windows XP (as shown in Figure 3).

You will notice XP is inside of a window. Within that window is a menu with three choices. One of those menus you will use quite often is the Machine menu. Of course you can not get to it if the virtual machine has captured your cursor. If you are working within your VM, and you want to get to that menu, click the right Ctrl key and your cursor is released.

From the Machine menu you can do a number of things such as:

* Change the view mode to full screen.
* Take a snapshot of the current state of your virtual machine.
* Pause your virtual machine.
* Shutdown your virtual machine.
* Close your virtual machine.

Figure 4

Instead of going through the standard process of shutting down Windows XP the easiest method of shutdown is to first Pause the virtual machine and then Close the virtual machine. When you pause the VM the screen will turn gray (see Figure 4) and you can then close that machine.

When you click Close you will see another window asking if you want to just close the machine or if you want to save the machine state before you close it. If you haven’t saved the machine recently go ahead and select save machine state.

Now when you start that Virtual Machine back up it will start up in the same state it was when you closed it. Imagine starting up Windows XP in less than 5 seconds! That is what you will experience when starting a virtual machine from a saved state.

When all of your machines are closed you can then exit VirtualBox from the File menu of the main window.

Final thoughts

I hope your experience with VirtualBox is as good as mine. I have used a number of virtual machine software – from costly proprietary to free open source and I have to say that VirtualBox is one of the best.

The world of virtual OSes continues to grow and grow. If you never experienced a virtual OS you should know they are outstanding tools that will help you with many tasks. You can test various environments, you can run software you couldn’t run before (i.e. games), you can run less stable OSes within more stable OSes. The limits almost seem boundless. And VirtualBox makes tackling virtual OSes not only easy, but free.

VirtualBox is easy to install – as easy as any other Linux application found within your distributions’ repositories. For this article we will be using Ubuntu Desktop 9.04. There will be no need to add any repository information.

Installing VirtualBox

As already stated, you will find VirtualBox within the repository of the Ubuntu distribution. So to install VirtualBox open up the Add/Remove Applications utility (found in the Applications menu), do a search for “virtualbox” (no quotes), select the correct results, and click the Apply to install the software.

After Virtualbox is installed there is one thing you must take care of. Without adding your user to the vboxusers group you will never be able to run VirtualBox as a standard user.

Adding the user to the group

Figure 1

This is actually quite easy. Go to the System menu and click on the Administration submenu. From that submenu select the Users and Groups entry. In the window that opens (see Figure 1) you will click the Manage Groups button. But before you click that button select a user and then click the Unlock button. This will give you administrative rights for this tool (you will have to enter your user password).

When this new window opens scroll all the way down until you see the vboxusers group. Select that group and then click.

Figure 2

Properties. In this new window (see Figure 2) select the user you want to add to the group and then select OK.

You can now close out the Groups and the Users tools. You are ready to start using Virtualbox.

Starting VirtualBox

You will find the VirtualBox listing in the Accessories submenu of the Applications menu. Click on that and VirtualBox will start.

Before you can actually start installing a virtual machine you have to take care of some administrative tasks. Never fear, though, this is all handled by a very easy to use Wizard that will walk you through every step of the way. The only instance you might get tripped up is Virtual Hard.

Figure 3

Disk step. Before VirtualBox can install an OS it has to have a virtual hard drive. This will happen around step 4 of the wizard (see Figure 3). In order to create a new virtual hard drive you have to click the New button. This will then take you into a completely different wizard. Again, this wizard is very simple and walks you through step by step.

Once you have created a virtual hard drive you will be taken back to the same screen as you were in for step 4. The only difference is your virtual hard drive will now be listed. You can now click Next to move on. The final screen will give you all of the information you have configured and you can then click Finish.

You are now ready to create a virtual machine. In my next article we will discuss the process of of creating a virtual machine.

Final thoughts

VirtualBox is an outstanding tool with almost limitless possibility for any administrator, developer, or computer user. It’s simplicity is only outshined by its possibilities.