Run Windows Server 2003 R2 Instead of Vista in a Virtual Machine
Windows Vista is just too big and slow to run comfortably in a Virtual Machine (VM) unless you have a really fast PC with a really fast hard drive. I've found running Vista as a VM on a notebook with a hard drive less than 7200 rpm (which is the norm for desktops) is just a bad idea. It doesn't matter if you have a reasonably decent amount of RAM (2GB on the host) and a fast processor (Core 2 Duo). I've even found Vista slow installed as a VM on a big server (10GB RAM, dual dual-core processors with 10000 rpm RAID-5 drives). The Windows Server 2008 (full GUI, not the Core version) seems to run reasonably well as a VM. But, I will reserve judgement on it until I get the RTM release and install it under both Virtual PC 2007 and Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1.
If you are looking for a relatively resource friendly version of Windows to run as VM on a relatively slow host PC, take a look at Windows Server 2003 R2. I'm running it on an old PC: Athlon 64 3200+ (2.2GHz) with 2GB RAM. I gave Windows Server 2003 R2 512MB RAM and it is running fast enough for me to feel comfortable when using it. I've run it with 384MB RAM (if you are on a PC with less than 2GB physical RAM) and it felt decent in that reduced configuration too. The base Windows Server feels lighter and faster than either XP or Vista in a virtualized environment. I may even use it as a virtual desktop PC instead of XP or Vista going forward. Since Windows Server 2003 R2 should remain under standard support until February 2010 (two years after Server 2008 debuts), it should be a reasonably secure Windows test environment for at least the next two years.
January 21st, 2009 - 12:08
I run on my AMD athlon 64 computer 3200+ Windows XP with 256 MB. I have try Virtual PC 2007 on my desktops computer and notebook , but a desktop computer be always faster than Notebook. My physical machine have less memory 512 mb, my physical machine Windows XP need 135 mb to run, i have not install anti-virus or firewall. I have some problem with my Nvidia geforce that why use now the standard Nvidia of Microsoft corporation driver. I think that you can best run virtual pc or better VMware under physical computer installed with Windows Server 2003 Enterprise. Windows Server have powerfull access to harddisk that what virtual machine need!