VirtualBox vs VMWare: Which is better and why?

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StriperMike

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Sep 2, 2007
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I've always been a VMware Workstation user when it comes to creating VMs to run various OSes and applications. I recently discovered Virtualbox which appears to have the same functionality as VMware Workstation v7 and at a much better price.

Are there any real differences between the two that would make using one better over the other? Performance, features, etc.

I would love to hear some of your opinions. I will be running this on a i5-2500k with 8GB RAM and Windows 7 x64.

Thanks,
Mike
 
Schadenfroh

Schadenfroh

Elite Member
Mar 8, 2003
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VMware Player is the free equivalent of VMware (in non-corporate environments).

I prefer VMware for the automated installs and better performance (much more R&D resources get pumped into VMware than VirtualBox). After the last major release (around the time of the Oracle rebrand), VirtualBox seemed to corrupt my Linux installs that use EXT4 (might have been an issue with the host software on OpenSolaris). This does not happen anymore, but left a bad taste in my mouth.

I use VirtualBox at work and VMWare Player at home.
 
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stargazr

Diamond Member
Jun 13, 2010
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I have VMWare Workstation and have been real happy with it, although I never used VirtualBox. VMWare Player can only run VM's, you need Workstation to create them. I have a Ubuntu VM along with several Windows versions, and even DOS.
 
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DaveSimmons

Elite Member
Aug 12, 2001
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I use VMWare Workstation for work, running Linux servers and Windows desktop OSs for development and testing.

I've only used VirtualBox a little bit for testing but it seemed less polished when it came to setting up and running VMs, even if the basic functionality was there. Examples are the install process, virtual networking features and "extras" for the guest OS.

VMWare Workstation is reasonably priced for work use, and the player is free if you have co-workers that only need to run VMs not build them.

And yes, after what Oracle has done to Java I wouldn't trust them not to mess up VirtualBox somehow just when you'd started to depend on it.
 
Steltek

Steltek

Diamond Member
Mar 29, 2001
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tl60 said:
VMWare Player can only run VM's, you need Workstation to create them. I have a Ubuntu VM along with several Windows versions, and even DOS.
Click to expand...

No longer true. Effective with the version 3 and later of VMware Player and later, you can create virtual machines. It uses the same creation wizards, but lacks the more advanced features of Workstation.

StriperMike said:
I've always been a VMware Workstation user when it comes to creating VMs to run various OSes and applications. I recently discovered Virtualbox which appears to have the same functionality as VMware Workstation v7 and at a much better price.

Are there any real differences between the two that would make using one better over the other? Performance, features, etc.

I would love to hear some of your opinions. I will be running this on a i5-2500k with 8GB RAM and Windows 7 x64.

Thanks,
Mike
Click to expand...

Nothing (save lack of hard disk space) prevents you from installing both VMware and VirtualBox at the same time to compare them. I run them both on a 4GB Q9550-based system with no problems.

Overall, I think the first thing you will find is that VMware's user interface is more polished (VirtualBox lacks drag-n-drop file sharing between host and guest -- it uses a clumsier shared folder method). Virtualbox (at least the open source version) lacks USB support, but the Oracle closed source version resolves this with useable virtual USB support. VirtualBox also advertises graphics acceleration in non-Windows guests (I had it working in Ubuntu 10.04, though I've since had no luck at all getting it working in Ubuntu 10.10 after an upgrade....), while VMware only accelerates graphics within Windows guests.

I still tend to use VirtualBox for my Linux stuff, but I've begin to wean myself off of it as I have serious doubts about Oracle in general. They've shown themselves to be at best extremely untrustworthy, and there is no doubt in my mind that they will instantly pull the same crap with VirtualBox as they have with both Java and Open Solaris should VirtualBox ever seem to reach true parity with competing VMware products.
 
0roo0roo

0roo0roo

No Lifer
Sep 21, 2002
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Steltek said:
and there is no doubt in my mind that they will instantly pull the same crap with VirtualBox as they have with both Java and Open Solaris should VirtualBox ever seem to reach true parity with competing VMware products.
Click to expand...

at virtualbox development rate? never...
 
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StriperMike

Member
Sep 2, 2007
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Thanks for the all the replies thus far. Sounds like I will stick to Vmware Workstation v7 for now. It's never caused me any problems in the past so I will stick with what works.

Much appreciated!
 
Nothinman

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
30,672
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Yea, if you actually paid for VMware Workstation there's no reason to look at VirtualBox.
 
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StriperMike

Member
Sep 2, 2007
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I have a license so that was never a concern. I had heard/read about Virtualbox and was considering making a jump if there was a compelling reason. According to the responses I received there does not appear to be one.
 
Nothinman

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
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VMware is still at the front of the pack with virtualization, the other options out there are usually only chosen for non-technical reasons like licensing or support.
 
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Emulex

Diamond Member
Jan 28, 2001
9,759
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vmware workstation is slick - you can boot ESX in a vm ;)

I like esxi 4.1 - set it up and forget about it. love it. solid as a rock.
 
bigi

bigi

Platinum Member
Aug 8, 2001
2,490
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Well, Virtualbox is free. It's been developed for long and works more than fine. I've used it a lot for testing and it's been very valuable tool.

wmware workstation is a great product - no doubt. But, not everyone needs to drop close to $200 if free virtualbox meets their needs.

For all interested, as said before, virtualbox is free and can be checked out. VMware seems to have trial version. See what works for you and allocate $200 accordingly.
 
Nothinman

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
30,672
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bigi said:
Well, Virtualbox is free. It's been developed for long and works more than fine. I've used it a lot for testing and it's been very valuable tool.

wmware workstation is a great product - no doubt. But, not everyone needs to drop close to $200 if free virtualbox meets their needs.

For all interested, as said before, virtualbox is free and can be checked out. VMware seems to have trial version. See what works for you and allocate $200 accordingly.
Click to expand...

Sadly, Oracle owns VirtualBox now so it'll probably get fucked up pretty badly unless a free version is forked like Oo_Org->Libre Office.
 
KentState

KentState

Diamond Member
Oct 19, 2001
8,397
393
126
The never features of VMWare Workstation are pretty slick. You can create virtuals and drag them through the GUI to vSphere and they automatically move over. Also have the option of running the VM's as a background service.
 
Red Squirrel

Red Squirrel

No Lifer
May 24, 2003
70,214
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www.anyf.ca
I have about 5 production VMs running on virtualbox at home, and it works fine. Though it's more meant as a "desktop" vm software than server. One thing I don't like about it is the way it organizes VMs. Rather than letting you pick a folder and everything goes in that folder, stuff goes all over the place on the system, and in the home directory of the user, at that. There are work arounds to this though.

VMware workstation is pretty good too, and has extra features like drag and drop into a vm and such.

I just hope that Oracle does not do something stupid wtih VB such as start charging for it. Though it looks like they are leaving it alone. When they got taken over, the forums and all remained the same, just a rebrand.
 
Nothinman

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
30,672
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takeru said:
didn't oracle "give" openoffice to apache?
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/oracle-gives-openoffice-to-apache/9035
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That was essentially a big middle finger to The Documentation Foundation and LibreOffice: http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/06/oracle-spurns-libreoffice-wants-to-give-ooo-to-apache-foundation.ars. The fork actually happened in Sept of '10 so that was essentially Oracle giving up on OpenOffice and being a dick about the whole thing ~9mo later.
 
Steltek

Steltek

Diamond Member
Mar 29, 2001
3,311
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Nothinman said:
That was essentially a big middle finger to The Documentation Foundation and LibreOffice: http://arstechnica.com/open-source/...ce-wants-to-give-ooo-to-apache-foundation.ars. The fork actually happened in Sept of '10 so that was essentially Oracle giving up on OpenOffice and being a dick about the whole thing ~9mo later.
Click to expand...

I keep expecting every day to read that Oracle has trademarked the "big middle finger" to use as their new corporate symbol. After all, it perfectly describes Larry Ellison's vision for how the Oracle/customer business relationship should work....
 
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