When finally it was installed I still had to do some tweaking. The former took me around an hour or so, not counting the half hour of frustration I spent calling Microsoft’s automated product registration line the next day, while the latter takes all of 20 minutes, if that much. Installing Windows takes far longer than Ubuntu. It’s funny how much the Windows XP install screen resembles the blue screen of death. It read the CD, just as though it were a computer booting up, and began the install process. Once everything was in place, I started the machine. If you don’t have a copy of VirtualBox, you can download it here or from the Ubuntu repositories (check Synaptic Package Manager for it). I wasn’t sure how well Windows would work in this environment, or how VirtualBox would handle it.Īfter inserting the CD (no reboot, of course) I went through the steps on VirtualBox to set up a new machine. ![]() ![]() The tag with the Windows product key is still on the case, so I knew I had everything I need on that end of things. Not long ago I used VirtualBox OSE on my laptop to try out the Android Live CD, so it was fresh on my mind as I dug out the re-install disks for Windows XP that came with our desktop. While Wine may be good for running Excel on a Linux computer (but then, why not just use ?) and some other office software, from what I have seen Wine is not yet in a place where it really solves the problem for a majority of applications. Games especially froze up, generally before they even started. The answer is yes, of course I did, but it never worked correctly. Someone will ask if I tried Wine, an application which enables users to run Windows programs on computers using other platforms. ![]() That’s where my fun with VirtualBox began. ![]() Sure, they are probably laden with spyware and adware, but all he knows is that there are things he could be playing but can’t. Still, my 7 year old son has complained occasionally about wanting to download games that only run in Windows. Our only contact with Windows has been at the homes of friends. I now also have a laptop running Ubuntu 9.04. I installed Ubuntu 8.10 on the home desktop (click here to see why dual boot didn’t work in this case) and the computer I use at work is an iMac. For several months now my family and I have been off of Microsoft Windows.
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