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Simultaneous Windows 7 and Ubuntu?

J

JackBN

Member
I have Windows 7 Pro on one SSD and Ubuntu on another SSD.
Thus, I can choose which to boot.

BUT I would prefer to run both simultaneously.
Yes, I know about dual boot, but that is not simultaneous.
I want to switch between the two OS's with a keystroke or two.
I hope to avoid using a second computer, although that is the alternative.

The system contains a Haswell i7-4770K, 16GB of 1866 RAM, and one or two SSDs, so the hardware is certainly adequate.

I have Microsoft Virtual PC with XP installed in Windows & Pro, and I need it for a DOS program I still use.

Is there a way to run Ubuntu simultaneous, perhaps in Virtual PC (while preserving XP)?

Incidentally, I have no antivirus in XP Mode, but do no surfing via XP Mode, and the Firewall is on.
 
What kinds of things are you looking to run in the different operating systems? I use a XP virtual machine for testing and absorbing crapware that I don't want infesting my main machine.

If you need 3D graphics on Windows 7 your choices probably boil down to using 7 as the main OS and running Ubuntu inside a virtual machine, OR you could setup a a hypervisor that supports graphics passthrough and run both OSes under that. Unfortunately, PCI/GPU passthrough does not work on 'K' processors so your hardware will not support it.

I'm planning a project like you describe but I'm still in the planning stages honestly.
 
Ubuntu used to have some layer of apps running on top of Windows. Not sure where that is now. Virtual PC isn't best choice for running linux. There are some own source choices...
 
VMWare Workstation > VirtualBox > Virtual PC

VMWare costs a bit but will run desktop linux at almost bare metal speed under Windows. With 16GB RAM you could have Ubuntu and XP running simultaneously using VMWare, no problem. VirtualPC would be my last choice even for running XP.
 
What I would do is to have a lightweight version of Linux as OS for the computer (less malware and more stability) and 3 virtual machines, each with its own SSD (maybe you can put the XP in the same one as W7m if you only use it for DOS).

It should work well and be safe and flexible, and with 16GB of RAM you should have enough memory.
 
A question for the persons knowledgeable with virtualization and somewhat relevant to this thread. When is Xen recommended to be used?
 
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