Friday, May 08, 2009
How many Intel CPUs will fail the XP Mode test in Windows 7? | Ed Bott’s Microsoft Report | ZDNet.com
If you are planning on running Windows 7's XP virtualization on your existing processor read this. Read this especially if you are running Intel. I'm pleased to discover that both my CPU's, laptop and desktop, will run it if I choose to. If you can't run MS's virtualization the good new is that Parallels is working on their own solution and of course there is always VMWare, but you will need to supply your own XP license where as Win 7 will come with an XP license for the purpose.
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1. It's going to be awfully confusing for folks who have to get down to silicon rev levels to determine whether they have VT or not.
ReplyDelete2. Don't even think about running virtual XP unless you have a spare gigabyte or more of unshared memory. Virtualization shares the CPU, not memory. Not enough memory and it spills over onto your (very slow memory) hard drive.
3. Let's not get out of hand here on virtualization. Remember, you can still "bootcamp" Windows 7 and XP to dual boot on the same machine. Not as elegant as virtualization, but runs on about any machine that supports Vista today, including hundreds of millions of installed machines.
4. I would not install XP under Windows 7 until I had first tried: a) running XP apps and games under Windows 7 native; b) running XP apps in Windows 7 compatibility mode (same as Vista's compatibility mode to use).
Thanks for adding your thoughts Peter. The good news on the RAM is that it is a reasonably priced and easy upgrade these days. I'm seriously thinking of taking my laptop up to 4 from 2. My desktop is already at 4. Also well priced are good, fast, large hard drives, but they are never a replacement for RAM. I agree that you should always see if something will run in compatibility mode before you look at virtualization. Also for home users, older games (the ones you still love but don't have updates) will most likely *not* do well under virtualization, so a dual boot may be the best answer for that.
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