VirtualBox

[#1]

All I can say Is AWESOME,  Why have I not found this before!! Now I can use Linux and run windows etc In virtual box as and when I need, Brilliant. Isadora here I come Yippee!!

[#2]

Pretty sure I did mention it before. I have an XP install running ( hardly ever switched on) and have had for a couple of years.
IF I need M$ run up VB and is on in a few seconds then click on suspend or snapshot (if I have installed something) and off it goes again never to bother me for a while (only downside is that EVERY time I switch it on it wants to update something and download GB's from M$ 

[#3]

Virtualbox is the bees knees, a huge shame and worry though that its now in the hands of Oracle, who with their bad faith acts with Java, OpenSalaris, MySQL etc leave me with no confidence at all that they wont try to shaft everyone they can.

[#4]

The best one to use is the closed source one, unfortunately. It allows you to use USB devices inside the virtual container. So if you have something that needs to access M$ and there is no Linux driver you can use that.
I use it to print DVD's etc to my Canon printer. I have the printer setup as 2 devices, one for general Linux use and the other as a RAW queue, then the M$ VB prints to the raw queue (or you could print directly if you don't have it installed in CUPS)

[#5]

There's a few alternatives though. Personally I use native Linux KVM with QEMU to run XP pro VMs. Works surprisingly well although I can't say I've stress tested every possible config option.

[#6]

Just gave It a good test and with me only having 2 GB of ram It does work rather well, Unfortunately Its not running my windows games In It rather well though

[#7]

Do you have the 3D option enabled, and more graphics memory allocated?
I don't play games via it so thats all the options I can think of.

[#8]

Thats the weird thing, Windows or linux on their own can recognize and Install my nvidia graphics card but In the virtual box I cant Install a graphic card? So stuck In there using 2d.

[#9]

I suspect Virtualbox and Linux won't allow Windows (or any VM) to take direct control of the video hardware, but instead presents its own (the VM software) video "hardware" for Windows to interact with.

[#10]

Back to the drawing board then, Meantime I'm going to dual boot Linux mint 9 and windows 7 side by side.

[#11]

There IS an option to enable 3D but is in beta, I haven't enabled it as I don't need it. Check the VM settings and see if you can enable it. You still will not be able to use NV driver as the VM is a container it doesn't see the hardware it is running on.

[#12]

You could use Windows 7 (Pro or higher) and set up a virtual machine to run the Linux in!

[#13]

@Jelv I like how It has to be Pro or higher yet In Linux mint It's clearly free, widely available, And good at It's job, So wont be running Linux via VB.@ Hairy Biker. I never thought of that will have to have a looky, Dont mind If It cant do my Nvidia as long as there Is some form of 3D. Its only for the games I've paid for or I would be using Linux full time, Its frustrating.

[#14]

Quote from: fourfourdevon

I suspect Virtualbox and Linux won't allow Windows (or any VM) to take direct control of the video hardware, but instead presents its own (the VM software) video "hardware" for Windows to interact with.

Must admit I've not really used the VMs for gaming - I tend to use WINE when there's any need to kill something with extreme prejudice 
There are a number of initiatives to get DirectX and OpenGL into VMs - the most promising appears to be some form of virtualisation running on the GPU itself which the VM client can then claim as it's own. There are issues with this - the main one seems to be that GPU architectures change much more rapidly than the x86 CPU lines. I think it'll be a while before this takes off, although as VMs move out of the server farms into the desktop arena maybe this will start to be a higher priority. Interesting times.

[#15]

Yesterday I used Win XP in virtualbox (OSE) to flash my router firmware! I had to bridge the networking directly onto the eth0, and it just worked.
If Oracle start playing silly games I expect VB OSE will be forked.