Multiple Versions of Windows on one machine possible?

[ManniB]

Hello,

I have Windows 10 Pro installed on one PC and would like to test the software I have developed. For the software testing I would like to have multiple Windows Versions running on the same PC.

For example, I would first like to be able to run another Windows 10 on my PC and install a software there to check, if the installation is right on a "new" PC also and not only on my "developement Windows installation". This would be enough in the beginning

Later, I would also like to be able to have another Windows 7 installation, Windows 8 installation etc. on the same PC where I can test the software. I don't want to have multiple PCs for this purpose.

How is this done in the easiest way?

Thanks,
Manni

 

[Mike Lewis]

Hi Manni,

This is quite a common requirement. In fact, I expect many of the developers in this forum have come up against it. I certainly have.

What you want is something called a virtual machine (or VM). Essentially, this is software that you install under Windows 10. One of the more popular VMs in the Oracle VirtualBox (

https://www.virtualbox.org/)

which is free, but there are other products as well.

However, that's not the end of the story. Once you have installed the VM, you then need to install the target operating system within the VM (often referred to as the guest system). And to do that, you will need a valid licence for the OS, which in the case of Windows is not free.

Having done all that, you "boot" the virtual machine simply by running the VM software from within your main Windows 10 system. You then can then work within the guest operating system in the usual way, including installing and running your own software.

An important feature is that the VM is almost entirely self-contained. Whatever changes you make to the guest system, there is no effect on your main OS. Importantly, you can completely delete the guest system by deleting a single file on your hard drive. So you can make a complete mess of the virtual system and still easily revert your computer to a clean state.

Be aware that there are several constraints on the ability to run a VM, including the amount of RAM and disk space, the type of processor and the version of Windows. I suggest you google something like "Virtual Machine Windows 10" to find out more.

Hope this helps.

Mike



__________________________________
Mike Lewis (Edinburgh, Scotland)

Visual FoxPro articles, tips and downloads

 

[goombawaho]

Or multiple hard drives that you switch in/out. More tedious and more expensive, but 100% separate and no thinking involved.

 

[xwb]

The other way of using VMs is to snapshot the state. For testing, rollback to the previous state and you'll be ready to start from a clean machine in a matter of seconds.

The three VM providers I've used are

Hyper-V
VM Ware
Virtual box

If you are using this for commercial stuff, you need to buy a copy of VM Ware.

MS provide a free VM with visual studio built in. They expire every 6 months but then you just download the next one to test your software. Have a look at

Download a Windows virtual machine - Windows app development

Start building Windows applications quickly by using a virtual machine with the latest versions of Windows, the developer tools, SDKs, and samples ready to go.

developer.microsoft.com

Just download, unzip and run. You don't have to go through the trouble of doing installs. One problem I find is because I am UK based, I have to change the keyboard - it defaults to US. You don't have to patch them - they have the latest patches.

 

[ManniB]

Mike, thank you very much for your thorough explanation! Indeed, VMs seams to be what I am looking for. I've checked my PC's hardware and it is good enough to meet requirements for running VMs.

Now I'm trying to decide which VM is the easiest do implement, also not causing any problems with the existing environment. I tried it with Hyper-V but it messed with my network connection (internet became very slow), so I reset the network settings and turned it off.

Is Virtual Box a better and easier option than Hyper-V? What are your experiences?

Another question: After installing a VM, can I use the same copy of Windows 10 to install on the VM or do I have to buy a new one? I don't have a DVD, my Windows 10 Pro just came installed with the laptop.

 

[ManniB]

xwb, why do I need VM Ware for commercial stuff? Main reason I want to use a VM at the moment is to test, if installing and updating my application on a "new pc" including the registration of DLL files in the windows registry, also to check if any errors appear during installation.

What's the advantage of VM Ware? At the moment I would like a very simplistic way of a VM with windows 10 installed (don't have time to get deeply involved with this at the moment). Is Hyper-V or Virtualbox not working fine?

 

[strongm]

I think xwb is suggesting that if you decide to go with VMware's Workstation Player product then the free version is only available for non-commercial, personal and home use; commercial use (e.g. testing for a commercial product, or for software being used within a commercial organisation) requires commercial licenses to use Workstation Player.

Hyper-V included with Windows 10 is free to use, as is VirtualBox. Hyper-V supports slightly fewer guest OSs than VirtualBox (for example it doesn't officially support XP, or Windows Server 2003)

>can I use the same copy of Windows 10 to install on the VM or do I have to buy a new one?

You are supposed to buy a new licence, I am afraid.

 

[ManniB]

Thank you strongm and xwb, I think I know where to go from here.

 

[spamjim]

>can I use the same copy of Windows 10 to install on the VM or do I have to buy a new one?

>You are supposed to buy a new licence, I am afraid.

The link in xwb's post offers free 90-day licenses. There's no need to buy separate licenses for testing.

 

[ManniB]

Thanks spamjim, I totally overlooked the link. I thought you had to install VB for it to work. But apparently I can, for example, download VirtualBox directly with Windows 10 without having to install anything?

 

[strongm]

>The link in xwb's post offers free 90-day licenses. There's no need to buy separate licenses for testing.

As long as it is the VM that you are testing, rather than using the VM to test something else (in this case the OPs software) - Microsoft's evaluation licence is pretty explicit about that

 

[spamjim]

I thought you had to install VB for it to work.

In the VMs that I use, linked below, VirtualBox does need to be installed. I suspect that is the same case with the link from xwb. It seems unlikely that Oracle would license Microsoft to distribute VirtualBox.

I misinterpreted the length of usage in xwb's link. The 90-day trial comes from the Edge/tools VM linked below. The length of usage in xwb's link is different.

strongm, I'm not sure which evaluation license you're looking at. Both the VMs at xwb's link and at

https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/tools/vms/

specify that the VM license supersedes the standard OS license that appears within the VM image. These are specifically offered to test compatibility of designed applications.

License from xwb's link:

1.c. "You may use the software in the virtual hard disk image only to demonstrate and internally evaluate it. You may not use the software for commercial purposes. You may not use the software in a live operating environment."

License from the other ms-edge VM trial link:

1.b. "You may use the software for testing purposes only. You may not use the software for commercial purposes. You may not use the software in a live operating environment."

If you actually purchased a Windows OS license for testing and blew it away (reset it) for each iteration of a test, Microsoft's license activation service would suspect abuse and shut it down. That's specifically why these VMs are offered.

Note that this Microsoft post offers you to "test your site", not "test our OS" with the VM.

https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev...machines-now-available-on-microsoft-edge-dev/

These VMs are not intended as trials of Microsoft Windows. They are for developers to test their products on Windows.

 

[strongm]

>These are specifically offered to test compatibility of designed applications.

No, they are not. they are designed to let you evaluate visual studio on W10. The superseding licence states categorically - and has done since MS first started producing these evaluation VMs some years ago - that "1.c You may use the software in the virtual hard disk image only to demonstrate and internally evaluate it. You may not use the software for commercial purposes. You may not use the software in a live operating environment."

There's a pretty much identical clause for the licence for your W10 + Edge link. The primary idea at that time, 5 years ago, was to allow developers to see whether Edge could run their sites yet - i.e test if Edge was compatible with a website, not whether a website was compatible with Edge. A perhaps subtle but important difference.

Obviously you can use it the other way around in both cases (and many people do), but that's not in keeping with the terms of the licence.

 

[spamjim]

strongm, I cited both of those license sections to illustrate their similarity. There's also the blog entry from a Microsoft employee that explains what this license means for the Edge testing VM. Microsoft explicitly wants you to test software on these VMs. There is no difference in testing if something is compatible with Windows or if Windows is compatible with something. There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of what compatible means.

If you disagree with Microsoft's messaging on this topic, you should probably contact them to change it.

The primary idea at that time, 5 years ago

To make sure I didn't miss anything, I went back in time to confirm my understanding.

"Virtual Machines: Test versions of IE 6 through 11 using virtual machines that you download and manage in your own development environment."

[

https://web.archive.org/web/20140812201734/https://www.modern.ie/en-us

]

In multiple places on their web site, Microsoft promotes the use of these VMs in a "development environment".

"It is also highly recommended that you implement a rollback strategy for any virtual machines that you download. This could be as simple as holding on to the original archive that you downloaded, or you could take advantage of your virtualization platform’s snapshotting capability so that you can start over with a fresh VM at any time and not have to worry about the guest operating system running out of trial time."

[

https://web.archive.org/web/2014042...hd/virtualmachine_instructions_2014-01-21.pdf

]

Despite the advertised time limit of these VMs, Microsoft provides these instructions to reset them. Some of these systems had re-arming instructions displayed right on the desktop. Microsoft wanted developers to use these as long as necessary.

 

[ManniB]

Very interesting points, spamjim, so what's the conclusion if you want to test your software on Windows in a VM for a limited period of time? Which version / download should you choose ?

 

[spamjim]

I develop web tools so I have used the "Edge VM". The Edge VM originated with the

http://modern.ie

web site. Before the advent of the Edge browser, Microsoft was challenged with propping up Internet Explorer. These VMs would allow Mac/Linux/Win web developers to support the minority of users still stuck on MSIE (which would only run on Windows). As the Edge browser progresses toward better compatibility, this VM may not be offered for much longer.

The link shared by xwb seems better suited for desktop application development.

You might also consider the free Windows VM offered in Microsoft's Azure service. I believe that VM and the Azure service is free for the first year. A remote VM would save you hard drive space. My average Windows 10 VM (with no extra software) occupies about 32 GB on the hard drive. Headroom is needed in the VM for the frequent system updates/upgrades. The VM suggested by xwb likely requires more space.

 

[Aditi Tyagi]

Hello everyone,
I would like to participate in this discussion and share my views with all of you.

First of all, answering the question - Yes! It is possible to operate multiple versions of windows on one machine.
You can run multiple virtual machines at once, and they appear as separate windowed applications or take over the full screen. That means with single hardware like a keyboard/mouse; you can use multiple windows. But I will say that it is never easy to operate this without the appropriate technology. So you can work better with virtual desktop infrastructure, which is best suited for multiple operating systems. Not only this, but you can also use Linux on a Windows OS desktop or laptop or vice versa.

This is why VDI helps many organizations set up the work environment for their remote workers.