Windows 7 XP Mode
I use virtual machines for all my development work. One of the projects I was working on was based around a simple desktop application so I had setup a Windows XP image with Visual Studio 2008 and SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1. I had used the same product key as the host machine since it would be running on the same hardware. When I moved it over to my new machine, the Genuine Advantage thing kicked in and started whining.
Rather than dealing with that, I decided to give Windows 7 XP Mode a try. So far, it seems pretty good. It appears to run faster than a discrete VM, it’s well integrated with the operating system and it automatically recognized all my drives, both internal and external. One thing I found disappointing was the number of updates required. I’ve come to expect to spend a significant amount of time patching the OS when building VMs but I didn’t anticipate doing the same with a newly downloaded VM. All in all though, a very positive experience. If you have native XP software that you need to run, this is definitely the way to go.
- Dave