On Sun, Apr 11, 2010 at 10:03:24AM -0400, Nick Nobody wrote: > On Sun, 2010-04-11 at 05:02 -0400, [email protected] wrote: > > I have several old laptops (running Windows 95 and Windows 2000) that > > are being decommissioned, and one new one on which there is an > > occasional-use Windows XP system. (The new one normally runs Linux) > > > > I'd like to copy their contents into virtual machines running under > > Linux. Preferable free-software VMs. > > > > (1) What virtual-machine systems, and what image-creation software, do > > you recommend? > > > > (2) They're all 32-bit systems, but at some time in the future, (years > > off now, but I plan ahead) 32-bit Intel systems are probably going to > > become unavailable, and I'll have to emulate on something else. > > Does this affect your answer? > > > > -- hendrik > > > > I think virtualbox would be the perfect solution for you. It's free > software (apt-get install virtualbox-ose), it's fast, and you can run > 32bit guests from a 64bit host environment. > > Apparently migrating windows installations to a virtualbox image is a > bit tricky, but they have a page with some instructions to help you > along: http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Migrate_Windows > > I've been using virtualbox for years and it hasn't let me down, it's a > really nice piece of software. Although I should mention that if you > need USB support you'll have to use the non-free version of virtualbox > which is available in binary form only from their website.
USB might well be an issue. We are rather used to USB sticks for moving files around on the Windows 2000 machine. But I suppose that thigs like USB mice and such would be handled by the underlying Linux and passed on somehow? Or could the underlying LInux manage USB sticks and their file systems for the emulator? The W95 machine has no USB ports, so that's no issue for it. Not running Windows much on the XP machine. Don't know what I'll want in the future when I end up emulating it, too. -- hendrik > > Hope this helps, > > nick > > _______________________________________________ > mlug mailing list > [email protected] > https://listes.koumbit.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mlug-listserv.mlug.ca _______________________________________________ mlug mailing list [email protected] https://listes.koumbit.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mlug-listserv.mlug.ca
