Free Virtual Machine Player - think PC in a window

[Dealster]

VMware has released the final version of its free virtual machine player. For those not familiar with virtualization technology this lets you run a virtual PC on your PC (think having a virtual PC in a window running the same or a completely different OS as the host). It can run MS Virtual PC machines as well as VMWare machines (and Symantec LiveState recovery formats).

VMware even has an internet browser appliance VM that contains a preconfigured Linux and Firefox. Hint - if you click in the window right after the browser appliance VM starts booting and then hit ESC, you can get to a boot menu that let's you boot off of a CD-ROM... hmmm if one had a bootable OS disk in the CD ROM they could probably install that OS into the browser appliance VM

There are several other ways you can create new virtual machines to run in the player. See this link for more details.

If you find this technology as useful as I have, you may be interested in checking out the player's big brother commercial product - VMware Workstation which adds the ability to take and manage multiple snapshots of a VM's state and easily move among them (if you are into software development or QA you need this tool!).

Disclaimer - this is my first new hot deal posting... I feel it is a hot deal because until the free player was released there was no way easy way (except maybe QEMU) to get this kind of capability without spending a couple hundred dollars. It is also simply very cool - Please no flames, just ignore the thread if you don't agree (I know this can be a tough crowd...)

 

[EKKC]

not to thread crap, but isnt this old news?

been using VMware for work and testing apps. i love it. wondering if i can allocate a core to my VM with my new 840 Dual Core baby

 

[Dealster]

Originally posted by: EKKC
not to thread crap, but isnt this old news?

been using VMware for work and testing apps. i love it. wondering if i can allocate a core to my VM with my new 840 Dual Core baby

Yes VMware has been around for a long time but the *free* player was just officially released in non-beta form this month (it has been out for a few months in beta form).

BTW, the player runs great on my dual core X2 system - I have the following in my .vmx file to force it to run on just one core:

processor0.use = FALSE
processor1.use = TRUE

 

[imported_wheelerdealer]

thanks for the post - I've been kicking around buying MS Virtual machine for a while, as I didn't know of a free alternative. Will definately try this

 

[marks70]

Originally posted by: Dealster
It can run MS Virtual PC machines as well as VMWare machines (and Symantec LiveState recovery formats).

Can you explain what you mean by this? I'm somewhat familiar with virtualization technology, but I don't understand your statement.

Edit:
Actually, after reading the info. on your link, I'm even more confused. How does this "Player" differ from VMWorkstation or Virtual PC?

 

[bodhammer]

Thanks, anyone know of a FreeBSD virtual machine to run under this?


EDIT: Fond one here: http://people.freebsd.org/~matusita/VMware/

 

[Dealster]

Actually, after reading the info. on your link, I'm even more confused. How does this "Player" differ from VMWorkstation or Virtual PC?

The player is basically the guts of VMWorkstation... it is the software emulation/mapping of the hardware in a typical PC. Think of it as a subset of VMworkstation, the part you use when running a virtual machine. That is the *only* thing you can directly do in the player - run a virtual machine. VMWorkstation also provides the ability to easily create new virtual machines, take snapshots of their state, and a few other things. When they first offered the player it was a bit confusing as to why/how they could just freely give this much functionality away but I think they are using it as a marketing mechanism to build awareness that VMware is "the virtualization company" and make the VMware VM the standard for virtual PCs.

 

[EKKC]

yeah i dont think you can create a new VM/OS with the player?

 

[Dealster]

With some of the links I posted in the original posting you can, although it is also easy to take an existing VM as a starting point. Some posts on the VMware forums even indicate it is ok with the VMware folks to use the trial version of Workstation to create new VMs and continue using them with the player after the Workstation trial expires. I'd have to do some searching to find that thread but as I recall, someone from VMware basically said it was ok.

Also the .vmx file which really defines the machine is just a text file so it can be hand edited. The .vmdk file can be created using QEMU.