which is the best free virtualization software?

[steeladept]

I said it was a fast moving target  

Somehow I missed the release of Player 3.0 & 3.1.  Last I heard it was still on 2.5.  Thanks for the heads up. I will check it out now and compare it to my other favorites in the Type 2 (I think) hypervisor space - Workstation and VirtualBox.

EDIT:  I just noted it is essentially Workstation without a few of the major nice features - namely cloning and snapshots.  Actually there are a few other features, some which I actually use a lot at work, that are missing as well, but I don't consider them much more than nice features.  Cloning and Snapshots are now supported in VirtualBox (have been for a little while now) and is what made it comparable to Workstation in my opinion.  Like I said, the rest of the difference is just niceties.

Player is now useable for me.  Though I will likely stick with VirtualBox due to the snapshots feature.

[Shades]

@Steeladept:
VMWare player v3.x does create VM's...at least I was able to create 8 of them for a test I wanted to do.

Actually if you have the installation discs or iso's of those discs it is actually a breeze creating a new VM with VMWare Player. It recognizes the Windows version you want to install and adjusts some VMWare settings accordingly. Those settings are a very good starting point, making it really, really easy.


To be honest, I was busy creating VM's in VMWare Server and that gave me a lot of problems, especially with Windows 7 VM's. After spending/losing 3 days, I noticed the option to create VM's in VMWare Player and what took me three days to complete, was now done in 4 hours.

[steeladept]

techiedave beat you to it 

As I said above, it seems to me to be pretty much VMware Workstation without snapshots and a few other features most people will never use.  Shame it is missing snapshots/clones though.  I LOVE that feature and it is the main reason I will stick with VirtualBox for now.  VirtualBox doesn't support snapshots/clones as elegantly as Workstation (IMO), but it does work.

[Ath]

Shame it is missing snapshots/clones though.  I LOVE that feature ...

-steeladept (March 26, 2011, 05:49 AM)

That's about the only reason they are still providing the commercial Workstation edition, IMHO

[widgewunner]

@steeladept: Thanks for the excellent review!

I tried VirtualBox with Win98 but it keeps crashing on me. I seem to remember somewhere hearing that VMware handles the old windows versions better. Yes? No?

[techidave]

Yes, I used vmware player to install windows 98.  went without a hitch!

[techidave]

had a little trouble posting the above response.


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