[TriLUG] XP/Vista on Ubuntu (was: Parallels)

[Kevin Hunter]

At 10:48pm -0400 on Tue, 30 Sep 2008, Mark Freeze wrote:
> I guess I'd like to open up this discussion to ask if anyone could share a
> success story of running XP/Vista on Ubuntu? And with what package?
> I saw Parallels working with XP on a friends Mac.  I was suitably impressed
> so I was glad to see their version for Linux announced a while back. But, I
> need it to work *reliably*

Hmm, since we've now had two conflicting reports about Parallels and I'm
a big fan of healthy competition, my first thought/suggestion is "Why
not try it out for *your* scenario?"

VMWare server is a free (albeit via email-registration) download, and I
see Parellels has a trial version.  Seems to me that this is great
opportunity to see for yourself and your particular setup which works
for you.

I'll note a few things:

- VMWare server is free, but likely has expensive support.
- VMWare server is a "gateway drug" to mucho more expensive services
  like VMWare infrastructure.  What will you need?
- VMWare is an older, "battle-hardened" code base, built originally (I
  believe) against *nix.
- I have personally run WinXP with Ubuntu as host with only the standard
  "I didn't RTFM" for hiccups.

- Parallels is not free, but likely has less expensive support.
- Parallels doesn't appear to have as robust of an infrastructure
  management setup.
- Parallels was originally a Mac-only solution.  Is its *nix support as
  robust?
- I ran WinXP via a Mac host (not Ubuntu) successfully, but I never got
  it "quite right".  Others were able to get "native" performance.  I
  was not.

- There are other virtualization solutions as well.
  - I ran WinXP on Qemu (Ubuntu Feisty host) quite satisfactorily until
    fairly recently, without the kvm acceleration/VT chip capability.
  - I've heard reports of WinXP on Xen via newer chips with the VT
    instruction.
  - VirtualBox has garnered some good press recently, and I have run
    WinXP with it and Gutsy as host.

You asked for success stories but didn't elucidate on what you want to
do; I think you'll find plenty of success stories in the virtualization
world.  I don't think you'll find many with *your exact setup*, and
that's the real trick.  I suggest outlining exactly what you need from a
virtualized Win* setup, and then test for a few days.  The software
solutions are free (up to a point), so it's no financial setback to give
them all a taste.  Besides, you'll get a lay of the virtualization land
and be better able to articulate for yourself what you need and what you
get with each solution.

Or, you might propose to the list the end goal of what you hope to
accomplish and the constraints under which you're working (for
personal/business uses, only $X dollars to spend, etc.).  Folks might
have an alternative solution altogether.  Ya never know.

Kevin