Now there has been a lot of info running through the blog channels regarding VMWare recently, nearly all of it referencing VMWare’s bold step to make the server variation of GSX free. But in amongst this I discovered this neat little Blog from Mike Holdorf’s Blog regarding switching from Virtual PC to VMWare
So after all of this, it was time to give VMWare a try. I used VMWare a long time ago and it wasn’t a pleasant experience. I downloaded Workstation 5.5, installed and everything was fine. Upon download, I also downloaded a Virtual Machine Importer tool so I could reuse my existing VPC machines. I ran the importer and pulled in one of my BizTalk 2006 Beta 2 machines. Holy crap…the VMWare machine was just as fast as my host machine…something I never experienced with VPC. I think I’ve been sold on VMWare and here are a few of the benefits:
- Faster performance - I’ve been able to load Windows 2003 and XP with no issues
- Display support is better
- USB support is included
- Faster pause or hibernation - you can pause a machine with the click of a button and it’s paused
- Faster start up when paused
- No more loud beeps when you do something wrong - anyone have this issue with VMRC?
- Better disk allocation - VMWare can be set up to use 2 Gig Files automatically which will lead to less fragmentation
- Did I mention faster performance?
I too used to use Virtual PC at one time. I started on VMWare back in ‘99 and then switched to Virtual PC before switching back. I think at one time back when it was Connectix running the show they were almost keeping up with VMWare, but around the same time the Virtual Server Hosting was starting to take off with the release of ESX Server, Connectix was bought by MS and I’d say that led to there being a 9 - 12 month stall in what they were releasing and keeping in competition. In some respects I think VMWare were already ahead, but the process of MS swallowing Connectix was enough to put it further behind.
Mind you, I still wouldn’t bet against MS still coming up with the goods at some stage? And VMWare’s superior product at the moment means that the bar is already set quite high for what MS are going to have to achieve to gain some kind of parity?
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