asked on

Converting a Windows XP workstation to a Vmware appliance

I want to ask if anyone has had experience converting an existing Windows XP workstation to a virtual appliance and then running it within Windows 7 after the workstation has been upgraded. I have some users with legacy applications they won't let go of and dual-boot will not give them concurrent, real time access to both the new OS and their Windows XP workstation and this seemed to me to be a viable solution for the moment.

I'd have to install a licensed version of Vmware Workstation since the hardware workstation to virtual appliance converter doesn't create appliances that are compatible with the free Vmware Player.

Any thoughts or advice?

dmf415

Use XP mode, it is free with Windows 7 professional.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/download.aspx

hurtige

Most Windows XP applications run fine in Windows 7, however if Windows 7 doesn't work for these legacy applications then i would use XP mode which comes with windows 7 professional and up. check out this video for more information directly from Microsoft

http://res1.windows.microsoft.com/resbox/en/Windows%207/main/d/3/d3f571c9-9381-48b7-8b84-9ea4f371bd6d/d3f571c9-9381-48b7-8b84-9ea4f371bd6d.wmv

dmf415

hurtige: Thanks for posting what i already said.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

lancecurwensville

membership

This solution is only available to members.

To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.

Start Free Trial

hurtige

dmf415: I am sorry, you replied while i was halfway through answering.

Nozmoking

ASKER

Thanks for the input. No, I'm not partial to Vmware as a virtual environment except that I've used the Vmware player extensively for evaluating new operating systems. This scenario really only saves the time of reinstalling apps or parking a second machine next to the old one; converting a disk image to a virtual appliance and then having it available right on the Windows 7 desktop is an attractive solution and would be a big time saver. I'll check into both solutions mentioned and see what makes the most sense.

Thanks again,
-noz

lancecurwensville

Just a note on my comment: disk2vhd creates the virtual appliance, VirtualBox "plays" the virtual appliance.

bgoering

XP mode is great but requires your workstation to support virtualization extensions as well as higher end (professional, enterprise, ultimate) editions of Windows 7. But as noted it is free and likely your best choice if your hardware and Windows 7 license level supports it.

Another thing you may want to consider is VMware ThinApp (http://www.vmware.com/products/thinapp/). This allows you to package applications at the application level that will integrate natively with the Windows 7 desktop. For example you can launch and use an IE6 browser on Windows 7 just like you would use the IE8 that came with it. You can run multiple office versions concurrently.

Might be worth checking out. Good Luck

dmf415

oops, sure no problem. This has been happening several times to me. sorry.

Nozmoking

ASKER

VirtualBox was the most economical and easiest solution for this - the user is happy and it didn't take me very long to deploy other than the length of time it took to image the drive.

Thanks