Hey, well it’s finally time for my second weekend tutorial! This week I will be telling you how to run an operating system over your current windows operating system! Last week I showed you how to run Linux from a USB flash drive in a similar way, but this time you will be running it without a flash drive!

Why would you want to do this? Because you can easily set up an operating system without removing your current system or setting up a partition! If you are like me and run on windows vista then you may need to run older versions of windows so you can successfully run programs and alike without any damage to your pc!

Okay, well for this example I’m going to install Windows XP on Windows Vista! First you will need you point your browser to the Microsoft download centre, here (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=04D26402-3199-48A3-AFA2-2DC0B40A73B6&displaylang=en)

Download for ether 32 bit windows or 64 bit, if you are unsure on this, then right click on “my computer” on your desktop or start bar. You should be able to see which system you’re on.

When you have downloaded continue and install the program, on some versions of windows, it will warn you that your system is not correct for running the program, the full list of supported windows operating systems:
Supported Operating Systems:
Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition (32-bit x86); Windows Server 2003, Standard x64 Edition; Windows Vista Business; Windows Vista Business 64-bit edition; Windows Vista Enterprise; Windows Vista Enterprise 64-bit edition; Windows Vista Ultimate; Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition; Windows XP Professional Edition ; Windows XP Professional x64 Edition ; Windows XP Tablet PC Edition.

After installing, use the wizard to create a new virtual machine. Make sure you set the operating system correctly or use the “other” option on the list. When it asks you for ram settings it is best to leave it on 128mb. You can change this later….

Create a new virtual hard drive and set how much disk space you want to give to your virtual computer, I gave mine about 4GB…

Open your virtual machine, it should run like your computer on boot, now you can insert the disk, or capture your image… you can get free Linux online, or you can use a disk you already have… I used a disk image of windows xp, taken from a disk…

The setup should run smoothly from there, depending on your operating system… When finished installing, you can run you fake system like it would normally. Here are some needed key short cuts.

Full Screen: [Alt Gr] + [Enter]
Exit Full Screen: [Alt Gr] + [Enter]
Exit Mouse Control: [Alt Gr]

Another cool feature of this software is that you can save the state of your pc, and there is no need to boot!

Thank you for reading, and I hope you liked this weekend’s tutorial!

Thanks,

Brian