Possible to use VM to install Linux in Windows?

M

Mtt83

Limp Gawd
Joined
Apr 2, 2002
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I've seen in a few screenshots the people have been able to run windows inside of a virtual machine from within linux. I'd like to learn linux but cannot afford to fully switch, or dual boot, at this time because I need access to certain programs that only run in windows. (Work related.)

Is it possible to install linux on a virtual machine running inside of windows? If so, is there a freeware virtual machine solution that will allow me to do this? If I can get past this point then I'll dive into the sea of distros and hope to fish out a good one. Ubuntu seems popular for whatever reason.
 
Of course it is possible, I do it all the time.

I use VMware though, never touched VirtualPC and I think there's an issue with running Xorg X11 inside VirtualPC without the user modifying the xorg.conf to get it to run properly.
 
Yes, it is possible, and even recommended if you plan on playing with Linux without knowing exactly what's going on - you can take a snapshot of the system before you mess it all up, and restore from the snapshot without doing a complete reinstall.

Ubuntu is popular because it is the easiest/most user friendly distro. If you install it, don't forget to try to do as much as possible with the Terminal. It helps to not have to rely on the GUI to get things done, even if it may be tedious at first.

VMWare Server is free.
 
I downloaded VMWare Sever

VMware-server-win32-client-1.0.2-39867

And I was going to play with this on a Windows XP machine to see if I can set up a virtual session of Debian Linux however when I launch the program, I only have one options which is to connect to an already existing virtual host. I don't have a host to connect to as I am attempting to create one but the option is grayed out...:confused:

Am I missing something?
 
You need to download the server piece. You downloaded the client used to connect to a VMware Server host.

VMware Server for Windows Operating Systems. A master installer file containing all Windows components of VMware Server. Binary (.exe)
(md5sum:f85f10225400da8313e46db2da5db5ab)

You should also check the compatibility matrix to see if Debian is supported as a Guest OS.
 
So in order to get this to work properly, I will need to run both the server and client on the same machine?
 
No you only need the client if you wish to access the host from another machine. The server installation puts a local client on for you. You can toss the client if you want.
 
Thank you very much for the information. I'll give it a shot when I get home tonight.
 
Make sure you look over the Custom Options when you do the installation. It's been a few months since I put it on here at work. We use Linux to host the VMware Server machines we have but I installed it on my desktop and it works great. I recommend a dedicated NIC if you can help it.
 
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