virtualbox.org

Hello,

I 'm a former VBox user and community member that decided to stop using VBox around version 2.1.0. I chose to "abandon" VBox once I started to see some of the major changes Sun had in mind for the project like 3D hardware support. I figured it would be a bit of a bumpy road, especially with the complications involved in upgrading at the time. I liked the new features that were in the works, but I wanted Sun to iron out some of the kinks introduced since acquiring VBox from InnoTek. I assume all this has been worked out by now and that things are going fairly smoothly with the latest releases of VBox. I've recently downloaded version 3.0.4 and am considering getting back into it now, but I have a few questions.

First of all, I'd like to know, between versions 2.1.0 and 3.0.4, what are some of the major new features to be on the lookout for? Of course I'll be reading the user manual thoroughly as any user should, but I'd like a heads-up on what the most significant and useful changes are for an average home/power user.

Also, I'd like to know if there have been any significant bug fixes to the DOS legacy emulation support, or if it still suffers from too many glitches to recommend for everyday use. This isn't terribly important to me, but I'd like to know.

As a final question, I'd like to know if it is possible to test Windows 7 RC in VBox on a system with only 768MB RAM. I've read that it officially required 1GB RAM according to M$, but have read elsewhere that it'll run on as little as 512MB.

Buy newer Hardware with more RAM and read the Release Notes / Change Log in the User Manual.

First of all, I'd like to know, between versions 2.1.0 and 3.0.4, what are some of the major new features to be on the lookout for? Of course I'll be reading the user manual thoroughly as any user should, but I'd like a heads-up on what the most significant and useful changes are for an average home/power user.

You should read the change logs to find your answer, but aside for the improved performance and stability the things like 3D and the experimental SMP everything else is pretty much the same only better. You will find that host interface has been replaced with bridged I think.

Also, I'd like to know if there have been any significant bug fixes to the DOS legacy emulation support, or if it still suffers from too many glitches to recommend for everyday use. This isn't terribly important to me, but I'd like to know.

Nothin has changed that I can tell. No one is going to tune for an OS that old.

As a final question, I'd like to know if it is possible to test Windows 7 RC in VBox on a system with only 768MB RAM. I've read that it officially required 1GB RAM according to M$, but have read elsewhere that it'll run on as little as 512MB.

Win 7 will work at 512 meg albeit slow. Some things will seem like they take forever to load including the OS.

Thank you for your responses. I was mainly wanting to make sure nothing significant had changed which I would need to know about prior to installation. I'm sure someone would've said something if there was. Sounds like the VBox project has been going more or less like I figured it would. Thanks again. I'm sure I'll be testing the new version soon enough.

BTW, as far as RAM upgrades go, try matching something to a laptop with 256MB PC2700 onboard. I've tried already, but I ended up with a marginally incompatible high density 1GB module, which _almost_ worked for about a week, until I started having trouble installing some programs and had to downgrade back to my old low density 512MB to fix the problems I had. Believe me, if money were no object, I'd just buy a new laptop or shop more carefully for the RAM I need and be done with it. Nice thought though, but I'm patient enough to deal with the slow performance for now.

My XP host system has 1GB RAM.
For testing reasons I've been setting up and running three Win7 VMs (public Beta, RC, RTM) and I always assigned to those VMs 480MB of RAM, having no problems in running them, obviously not with heavy applications.

Perryg wrote:

As a final question, I'd like to know if it is possible to test Windows 7 RC in VBox on a system with only 768MB RAM. I've read that it officially required 1GB RAM according to M$, but have read elsewhere that it'll run on as little as 512MB.

Win 7 will work at 512 meg albeit slow. Some things will seem like they take forever to load including the OS.

VB 3.0.4. Vista host 2GB RAM, Win7 RC guest with 256MB RAM. Works great. 30-40 seconds to get to the logon screen, 10 seconds to shut down. Apps in the VM work fine, almost don't notice any slowness at all.
I was surprised.

Believe it.
tk