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Installing Windows 7 in a virtualbox virtual machine. VirtualBox virtual machine for beginners. Step-by-step deployment of the guest OS

After creating a virtual machine in VirtualBox, you can begin installing the Windows operating system (or any other) on the VirtualBox virtual machine. By installing an operating system on a virtual machine, you can use several operating systems on your computer at the same time: the main (host) and guest (virtual) operating systems.

The guest operating system installed on the virtual machine will operate in isolation from the main system installed on your computer. You can learn to work in a new OS, test applications, run outdated programs, use a virtual system for security purposes, etc. In this case, nothing will threaten the main system, and you can make any changes in the guest system.

In previous articles on my website, we discussed in detail the process of installing the VirtualBox virtualization program and the VirtualBox Extension Pack on a computer, creating and configuring a virtual machine in VirtualBox (you will find links to the articles mentioned here under this article). Now the final stage has come: installing the operating system in VirtualBox, installing the VirtualBox Guest Additions, final settings of the virtual machine.

Once the virtual machine has been created and configured, you can begin installing the operating system.

In this example, I install Windows 7 in a virtual machine; Windows 10 is installed on my computer (by the way, you can additionally install another Windows 10 on the virtual machine).

Installing Windows on VirtualBox

In the main window of the Oracle VM VirtualBox program, select the desired virtual machine if you have several virtual machines installed, and then click on the “Launch” button.

In the Virtual Box program window, the process of installing the operating system into the virtual machine will begin. The system installation process itself is no different from installing the system on a regular computer. Go through all the steps of installing the OS on a virtual computer.

After installing the operating system on the virtual machine, you will see Windows (or another operating system) in the VirtualBox program window.

A virtual OS requires customization to suit your needs, just like a regular system on your computer.

Immediately after installing the operating system on the virtual machine, you will need to install Additions for the guest operating system - VirtualBox Guest Additions, which consists of a set of drivers and utilities. After installing the add-on package, the functionality of the guest OS is noticeably improved.

Installing VirtualBox Guest Additions

In the window of the running virtual machine, go to the “Devices” menu item. Next, in the context menu, select “Mount guest OS Add-ons disk image...”.

After this, in the guest operating system you will need to open Explorer. In Explorer, you will see that the VirtualBox Guest Additions disk image is located in the place of the CD-DVD drive.

Now you will need to install VirtualBox Guest Additions.

Go through the steps of installing add-ons for the guest system by consistently clicking on the “Next” button. Agree to install software for devices.

After the installation of the guest OS package is complete, reboot the virtual operating system.

Creating a shared folder in VirtualBox

A shared folder is needed to exchange data between the main (host) and guest operating systems. First, you will need to create a shared folder on the main operating system installed on your computer. I have a “Data Sharing” folder on one of the drives on my computer, which is intended for data exchange.

In the “Folder Path” field, enter the path to the folder on the main system. Select "Other...", and then in the Explorer window, select or create the desired folder.

In the “Add a shared folder” window, check the “Auto-connect” and “Create a permanent folder” checkboxes, and then click the “OK” button.

In the Explorer window, go to “Network”, in the VBXSVR folder you will see a shared folder. In Virtual Box you can create several shared folders.

After installing additions for the guest OS, remove the ISO image of the operating system from the virtual machine's disk drive, since the system image is no longer needed.

For faster access, the shared folder can be added to the “Network location” of Explorer as a network drive. To do this, press the “Windows” + “R” buttons on your keyboard. In the Run window, in the Open field, enter the following command:

Net use x: \\vboxsvr\folder_name

Then click on the "OK" button.

After executing the command, the shared folder will appear in Explorer under “Network Location”.

Taking a System Snapshot in VirtualBox

VirtualBox has a very useful feature: Snapshots. An operating system snapshot is the current state of the operating system at the time the snapshot was taken. Essentially, it is a system backup for recovery. You can take one or more snapshots and then restore the system to the state it was in when the snapshot was taken.

Typical situation: an operating system was installed on a virtual machine, after configuring it and installing the necessary applications, a snapshot of the guest operating system was taken. After this, the user “killed” Windows (or another system), changed the configuration, etc. As a result of these actions, the operating system malfunctions or does not work at all.

Since this is a virtual OS, you can easily remove it from VirtualBox and then install a new system on the virtual machine. If a snapshot of the system was previously taken, then nothing will need to be done. In this case, it will be possible to restore the system to working condition using the previously taken “Snapshot”.

To create a system snapshot, click on the “Snapshots” button in the main VirtualBox window.

In the “Pictures” tab, click on the camera button. In the “Take a snapshot of a virtual machine” window, you will need to give a name to the snapshot being created, and in the description you can add additional information (I added the date the snapshot was created). Next, click on the “OK” button.

After this, the process of creating a snapshot of the system in Virtual Box occurs.

A system snapshot has been created and can be accessed from the main VirtualBox window. Just keep in mind that system snapshots take up some space on the guest operating system's disk.

Recovering using a system snapshot

If necessary, for example, in case of serious problems with the guest system, you can restore the state of the virtual machine using a previously taken system snapshot. Restoring using a system snapshot occurs when the virtual machine is turned off.

Click on the "Snapshots" button in the main VirtualBox window. In the “Snapshots” tab, right-click on the system snapshot, and in the context menu select “Restore snapshot”.

In the question window, agree to restore the image. If the guest system is not working, you can uncheck the “Create a snapshot of the current system state” checkbox so as not to create an unnecessary snapshot since the system is not working normally.

Click on the "Restore" button.

If you create a snapshot of the current state, give it a name and description.

In the next window, click on the “Restore” button.

The guest operating system will be restored to the virtual machine in the state at the time the system snapshot was taken.

VirtualBox Update

To update VirtualBox, you will need to download the installation file of the new version of the program, as well as the Extension Pack of the new version. After installing the program, all previously made settings will be saved.

After starting the guest operating system in the virtual machine, you will need to install the VirtualBox Guest Additions again. If several operating systems were installed in VirtualBox, then in this case, Add-ons for Guest OS will need to be installed on each operating system.

Conclusions of the article

You can install a guest operating system on a VirtualBox virtual machine, install the VirtualBox Guest Additions, create shared folders, take a snapshot of the system, and then restore the virtual OS using the snapshot.

Virtual machines are emulation of devices on another device or, in the context of this article and simplified, they allow you to run a virtual computer (like a regular program) with the desired operating system on your computer with the same or a different OS. For example, if you have Windows on your computer, you can run Linux or another version of Windows in a virtual machine and work with it like a regular computer.

This guide for beginners details how to create and configure a VirtualBox virtual machine (completely free software for working with virtual machines on Windows, MacOS and Linux), as well as some nuances on using VirtualBox that may be useful. By the way, Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise have built-in tools for working with virtual machines, see. Note: if Hyper-V components are installed on the computer, then VirtualBox will report the error Failed to open a session for the virtual machine, how to get around this:.

Note: virtual machines require that VT-x or AMD-V virtualization be enabled on the computer in the BIOS. It's usually enabled by default, but if something goes wrong, keep this in mind.

Now let's create our first virtual machine. The example below uses VirtualBox running on Windows; the guest OS (the one that is virtualized) will be Windows 10.

Click "New" in the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager window.
In the “Specify OS name and type” window, enter a custom name for the virtual machine, select the OS type that will be installed on it and the OS version. In my case - Windows 10 x64. Click Next.
Specify the amount of RAM allocated to your virtual machine. Ideally, enough for it to work, but not too large (since memory will be “taken away” from your main system when the virtual machine is launched). I recommend focusing on the values in the “green” zone.
In the next window, select “Create a new virtual hard disk.”
Select the disk type. In our case, if this virtual disk will not be used outside of VirtualBox - VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image).
Specify whether to use dynamic or fixed hard disk size. I usually use "Fixed" and manually set its size.
Specify the size of the virtual hard disk and where it will be stored on your computer or external drive (the size must be sufficient for the installation and operation of the guest operating system). Click "Create" and wait until the virtual disk is created.
Done, the virtual machine has been created and will appear in the list on the left in the VirtualBox window. To see the configuration information, as in the screenshot, click on the arrow to the right of the “Machines” button and select “Details”.

The virtual machine has been created, however, if you launch it, you will see nothing but a black screen with service information. Those. So far, only a “virtual computer” has been created and no operating system is installed on it.

Installing Windows in VirtualBox

In order to install Windows, in our case Windows 10, in the VirtualBox virtual machine you will need an ISO image with the system distribution (see). The next steps will look like this.

Once the installation is complete and the virtual machine is rebooted, it will be completely ready for use. However, you may want to make some additional settings.

Basic settings of the VirtualBox virtual machine

In the virtual machine settings (note that many settings are not available while the virtual machine is running), you can change the following basic settings:

Some of the above things can be done from a running virtual machine in the main menu: for example, you can connect a flash drive to the “Devices” item, remove or insert a disk (ISO), enable shared folders, etc.

Additional Information

Finally, here is some additional information that may be useful when using VirtualBox virtual machines.

At the time of the release of Windows 7, the bulk of its potential buyers were using Windows XP. Among them there were very few who decided to immediately and unconditionally switch to the new product. Most were in no hurry to retire old XP, since it turned out that a huge amount of software simply could not work under the new system. What could Microsoft do? Losing potential customers is not an option, so the solution was found: to release an update for Windows 7, which carries a virtualization package - a system function that allows you to run XP directly inside the “seven”.

The update under the name “Virtual PC” and number KB958599 was released in 2008. It is a virtual machine - an application that emulates computer hardware and creates an isolated environment inside the operating system, where you can install another OS, including a type other than Windows.

Microsoft's Virtual PC is included in Windows 7 Ultimate, Professional, and Enterprise editions. This virtual machine is specifically designed for installing Windows XP Service Pack 3 and solving problems with software that won’t start.

How to install Virtual PC?

Checking hardware virtualization support

If you have Ultimate, Enterprise or Professional installed on your PC and the automatic update function is enabled, you already have Virtual PC. Before you start using it, you need to make sure that your processor supports hardware virtualization. To check this, Microsoft has created a utility called Hardware-Assisted Virtualization Detection Tool, which you can simply download and run.

If the utility displays a message like in the screenshot below, it means that hardware virtualization is supported and you can use Virtual PC without additional settings.

If there is no such support (message in the window below), you need to make some more changes to the system.

Please note: Hardware virtualization is enabled and disabled in the BIOS, so if it does not work on your PC, try activating it in the BIOS Setup settings. The option may be called Intel_Virtualization Technology (for Intel processors), AMD-V (respectively, for AMD), Virtualization Extensions, etc.

In this example, the Intel_Virtualization Technology option is disabled. To enable it, you need to change the value from Disabled to Enabled.

If you cannot use hardware virtualization, Microsoft offers to install a patch that will still allow you to run Virtual PC on Windows 7. On the download page, you need to select the file version in accordance with the bitness of your system.

Installing Virtual PC manually

Manual installation of a virtual machine in Windows 7 includes the installation of 2 components:

Windows Virtual PC;
Windows XP Mode virtual disk;

Virtual PC is installed first. For this:

download update KB958599 from the official website, corresponding to the bit level of your Windows 7, and run it;

accept the license agreement;

wait for the installation to complete;

close the installer window and restart your PC.

Next you need to install the Windows XP Mode virtual disk:

run the installer downloaded from the official Microsoft website;

select a location for the virtual disk;

wait for the installation to complete;

check the “Run Windows XP mode” checkbox and click “Finish”.

First launch of Windows XP mode

After installing Windows XP mode, “Seven” will further configure it and create a virtual disk.

The first window will open in front of you, where you will have to accept the license agreement for using the program and click “Next”.

Next you will be asked to specify the folder where the virtual disk will be installed and create the first user.

Then - enable the protective functions of the created system (optional).

After clicking on the “Start installation” button, the installation process of the virtual machine with Windows XP will begin. All we have to do is wait for it to finish.

Creating a new virtual machine on Windows 7

Through Start or File Explorer, open the location of the XP Mode virtual disk.

Click the “Create virtual machine” button in the top menu of the folder.

After this, the wizard will launch and your new virtual machine will begin to be created. In the next box, enter her name and location.

Configure network settings and the amount of RAM (virtual Windows XP can be content with 512 megabytes of RAM, but you can allocate more).

Create a virtual hard disk (or use an existing one). Specify its type (dynamically expandable or fixed volume) and location. Click "Create".

After this, the newly created one will appear in the list of virtual machines. Right-click on it and select “Open” from the menu.

In the list of options, click on “DVD drive” and specify the path to the physical laser drive where the Windows XP disc is inserted. If you are going to install the system from an image, find its installation iso file in the directory - the virtual machine considers iso format images to be “optical drives”.

After this, the normal Windows XP installation process begins.

Using alternative virtual machines

In addition to its own Virtual PC component, Windows 7 supports virtualization systems from third-party manufacturers. Among them, the two most famous and widespread are Oracle VM VirtualBox and VMWare Workstation. Let's look at the principles of working with them using one example. Let's take VirtualBox from Oracle and create a new virtual machine on it to install the same “seven”.

After installing VirtualBox, open its main window - the virtual machine manager. Click the “Create” button in the top horizontal menu.

In the next window, write the name of the virtual machine and select its version and bitness from the list. In our example, this is Wibdows 7 32 bit.

Configure the amount of RAM that the virtual (guest) system will use.

Create a hard drive (or select one of the ones you created earlier).

Specify the disk type. If you don't know the difference, leave this option at the default (VDI).

Specify the data storage format - dynamically expanding virtual disk or fixed-size disk.

By moving the slider, set the size of the disk, and also indicate its name (if you want it to differ from the name of the “virtual drive”).

After clicking “Create”, the new virtual machine will appear in the list of the main window. On the right side are its settings.

To begin installing the operating system, click on the machine icon and click the “Run” button from the top panel.

Following this, another window will open - the one in which you will observe the progress of the OS installation and continue to work. The virtual machine manager window (the main one) can be minimized for now.

Here, as when creating a virtual machine on Virtual PC, you need to specify the path to the “seven” installation disk or iso image.

After the OS installation is completed, the virtual machine is ready for use. You need to launch it by clicking on the corresponding icon in the left vertical list of the main VirtualBox window. As you can see, creating “virtuals” is not at all difficult.

Creating a virtual machine on VMWare Workstation is also intuitive and in many ways similar to the procedure just discussed.

The release of a new version of the operating system is stressful for most users. Therefore, one of the main tasks of developers is to make the transition as smooth as possible. This doesn’t always work out, but the creators of Windows 7 turned out to be understanding people, and therefore introduced a virtualization package into the system that was new at that time, allowing you to run XP inside the “seven”.

General information

A virtual machine emulates hardware, creating an isolated environment within the system in which any OS can be installed. This allows you to solve many problems with software compatibility, and also makes it possible to “try” another system without deleting the current one. You will be able to work with physical drives, install games and programs for Windows XP without giving up the “seven”, save files and perform other tasks. Let's see how to install a virtual machine on Windows 7 to take advantage of all its useful features.

Checking for Virtual PC

If you installed Windows 7 Ultimate, Enterprise or Professional versions, then you have the Virtual PC feature by default. You just need to make sure that the processor supports hardware virtualization. This can be done using the utility from Microsoft Hardware-Assisted Virtualization Detection Tool.

Download the utility and run it. Depending on the results of the processor test, the following messages may appear on the screen.

Enabling/disabling virtualization is done in the BIOS settings, so before installing Virtual PC manually, make sure that the option is activated.

The option may be called Intel_Virtualization Technology, AMD-V, Virtualization Extensions, etc. Find this feature in the BIOS and change the value from “Disabled” to “Enabled”.

If after this you cannot start the virtual machine, Windows offers to install a special patch. At this stage, it is important to choose the correct system bit size – x32 or x64.

Manual installation

Installing a virtual machine on Windows 7 includes two steps:

Installing Windows Virtual PC;
Installing a Windows XP Mode virtual disk.

First, let's deal with Virtual PC:

Then you can proceed to installing the Windows XP Mode virtual disk:

First start

After installing XP Mode, the "seven" must further configure it to create a virtual disk. Therefore, after clicking the “Finish” button, the following window will appear on the screen, in which there will be another license agreement, the terms of which you must accept.

Specify the folder where the virtual disk will be located and create the first user.

Enable security features of the system you are creating. This is not necessary. Click "Start Installation".

The installation process will start; you just have to wait for it to end.

New virtual machine

The system is prepared, the virtual disk is installed. All that remains is to create a new environment and run Windows XP in it.

The newly created sandbox will appear in the XP Mode main window. Right-click on it and select “Open”. Select the “DVD drive” option and specify the path to the physical drive (if you have a disk with the Windows XP distribution) or a pre-downloaded ISO image. The system installation wizard will launch.

All you have to do is install Windows XP as usual to start using this system in an isolated environment created using the hardware virtualization feature.

After the installation is complete, you can use all the features of the Microsoft OS: install gadgets for Windows XP, install games that do not run on the “seven”, run outdated programs, etc. – to do this, just run XP mode through the emulator.

Alternative virtual machines

In addition to the built-in hardware virtualization feature, Windows 7 supports third-party programs that help you create an isolated environment and install any operating system into it.

First of all, it is necessary to note such virtualization systems as VMWare Workstation and Oracle VM VirtualBox. Let's look at the example of Virtualbox to see how such programs work.

Oracle VM Virtualbox

Download and install Virtualbox. It is installed in the same way as any other program, so you should not have any problems.

The isolated environment is ready. To start working with it, mark it with the left mouse button and click the “Run” button in the top menu.

A new window will appear on the screen through which you will first install and then interact with Windows 7 or another installed operating system. Specify the path to the physical disk or ISO image with the Windows distribution and click “Continue.”

We will not consider the Windows 7 installation process in detail here, since it is no different from a regular installation on a physical hard drive. You just need to wait until the system installation is completed.

The virtual machine is launched through the Oracle VM VirtualBox program. You will need to open this utility and select the desired virtual system image from the main menu on the left.

As for other utilities, in VMWare Workstation the process of creating a virtual machine almost completely repeats the procedure described above.

Some other programs may require additional configuration, so for beginners they may seem somewhat complicated.

Conclusion

Creating a virtual machine and installing a system on it is quite simple, but you need to be careful - since April 2014, Windows XP is not supported by Microsoft, therefore, even by emulating the mode of this OS, you make your system vulnerable.

In addition, XP mode is not supported on machines with Windows 8 installed, and there is no way to fix this. The Virtual PC feature was originally created for a smooth transition between systems, so skipping versions will not work.

But you can try installing a system other than Microsoft Windows - for example, Linux.

It’s quite difficult to switch to it right away, and you also have to give up most of the Windows programs you’re used to. In emulation mode, you will gradually get used to the peculiarities of interaction with the new system and decide whether you need to completely switch to it.

In this guide I will tell you how to install Windows Seven to virtual machine virtualbox(in particular for the version VirtualBox-3.0.10-54097-Win).

So, first, install virtualbox, then get the Windows 7 distribution kit (either a disk or an iso image).

Launch the virtualbox program and in the window that opens click on the blue button Create.

A wizard window will open, in which click the Next button.

In the new window, enter the machine name and select the system type: Windows 7.

In the next window, enter the size of the RAM; you cannot specify less than 512 Megabytes; in principle, they are enough to get acquainted with the system (I chose 800 MB).

If something doesn’t suit you, click the Properties button and specify additional parameters. I also recommend checking the Enable 3D acceleration checkbox. And also allocate several megabytes for video memory (I chose 50 MB).

Let's start the installation. Let's consider the option of installing Windows 7, which is located in the form of an .iso file, click on the Properties button, go to the CD/DVD-ROM section. Check the Connect CD/DVD checkbox and then select the ISO image file radio button.

Click on the icon to the right of the field, the Virtual Media Manager window will open. In it, click on the Add button and specify your ISO image. Then click the Select button.

If you burned the image to disk, select the Physical CD/DVD drive radio button and specify the desired drive letter.

All you have to do is click on the Start button and the installation of Windows 7 will begin.

Installing and configuring a virtual machine

To test the layout in ie7 I need Windows XP. In order to keep several operating systems on one computer, I use the virtualbox virtual machine. I also use the virtual machine to test programs that are unfamiliar to me. I don’t like installing unfamiliar software on the main OS. In this post I will tell you how to install and configure a virtual machine.

Creating a virtual machine

At the moment I am working on Windows 7, so we will install the virtualbox virtual machine on Windows 7. Let's go. Run the exe file VirtualBox-4.2.0-80737-Win and follow the commands of the installation wizard. Then we start creating our test virtual machine. Windows xp will be installed on virtualbox.

Setting up a virtualbox virtual machine

System tab

1 - go to settings in the "System" tab

2 - We leave only the hard drive and CD. Drag the CD below the hard drive

3 - turn off audio and usb

4 - turn on PAE

Media Tab

1 - click on the icon

2 - select an iso disk image with the installed OS on your disks

3 - After selection, the new disk is displayed

Network Tab

To configure network adapters in virtualbox, go to the "Network" tab. If our virtual machine will not work as a gateway for the internal network, then we select the configuration of one network adapter.

If our virtual machine will work as a gateway for the internal network, then we will need to configure two adapters, one of which looks outward and the other into the internal network.

At this point, the preliminary settings of our Oracle VM VirtualBox are completed and you can begin installing the OS by clicking the green “Launch” arrow.

Setting up virtualbox after installing windows xp

After we have installed our OS, we need to associate our virtual machine with the host so that we can transfer files and folders from the host. To do this, first install guest OS additions. In the window with our VM running, select “devices” -> “Install guest OS additions”:

Next, I will tell you how to set up a shared folder in virtualbox. After installation, reboot the virtual OS. Now you can create a shared folder with the host and the virtual machine. Let's create a folder C:\\for_VirtualPC. Now let's go to the settings of our machine in the "Shared Folders" tab and add the folder we created there.

It should look like this:

We reboot our virtual machine and if everything is fine, our folder should appear in “my computer”.

In Windows 7, creating a virtual machine is very simple if you have a detailed guide describing the sequence of steps. Below are step-by-step instructions on how to create and install another version of virtual Windows on a Windows 7 computer.

Brief definition of a virtual machine

Specialists from Microsoft, in order to facilitate the process of adaptation of users when switching to a new modification of Windows and eliminate difficulties with some non-functioning applications in the seventh version of the OS, have developed a special update “KB958599” for the “Seven” versions of Enterprise Professional and Ultimate and is available for download, for example , Windows XP in the Windows 7 environment.

This package is called “Virtual PC” - a program that emulates PC hardware, which installs a separate environment in Windows 7, in which a different version of the operating system is installed. It should be noted that in addition to the OS from Microsoft, you can install a system from another developer, for example, Linux.

Analysis of the possibility of creating a virtual machine

If your computer is running the following OS editions: Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate, then when automatically updating the operating system in your PC, “Virtual PC” is already downloaded. You just need to analyze the possibility of its use.

To this end, Microsoft has developed an application called the Hardware-Assisted Virtualization Detection Tool. You need to install this program from the developer’s official resource and after opening it will display a message about the possibility of the virtual machine running on specific hardware.

For example, when the alert shown in the figure below is displayed:

You can immediately launch “Virtual PC” and no preliminary adjustments of parameters are needed.

In case of a negative answer:

We can conclude that hardware virtualization is not supported and the user will have to make adjustments to the system. You need to enable it in the BIOS.

The function has different names, for example, “Intel_Virtualization Technology”, “Virtualization Extensions” and others.

If “Disabled” is displayed, it means it is turned off and you need to set “Enabled” on the contrary to enable it.

Procedure for manually creating a Virtual PC

To do this, you need to complete two main steps:

Install Windows Virtual PC;
Install a Windows XP Mode virtual disk.

The first stage consists of the following sequential actions:

The second stage consists of the following steps:

How to install a new virtual machine in Windows 7?

The sequence of actions consists of the following steps:

Use of visualization systems from third-party developers

In "Seven" you can use alternative methods for creating virtual machines. For example, VMWare Workstation and Oracle VM VirtualBox.

To create a new virtual machine through “VirtualBox” from Oracle, you must perform the following steps:

The algorithm for working in the VMWare Workstation program is similar to the action scenario described above and has an intuitive interface.

Installing a virtual machine on your computer is not as difficult as it might seem at first glance. In this article we will explain in detail how to install and configure virtualbox, as well as how to add new virtual machines. First, let's figure out what a virtual machine is.

For example, you have Windows 7 or higher operating system installed, but you need to use an application that runs exclusively on Windows XP. Agree, if you need to work with this application, it is not always advisable to reinstall the OS, especially on an outdated version of Windows. It’s easier to install a virtual machine on your computer, deploy Windows XP in it and run the required application without any problems.

Thus, a virtual machine is a full-fledged computer (containing a processor, RAM, hard drive and BIOS), running inside the computer through an emulator application.

Using a virtual machine you can:

test applications;
run programs that your OS does not support;
become familiar with the capabilities of other operating systems;
test the operation of network programs in closed virtual networks, etc.

Step-by-step installation of Virtualbox

To download Virtualbox, go to the official website www.virtualbox.org. Currently, the latest version of the utility is 5.0.10.

Run the downloaded installer file, click “Next”.

After this, the next program window will launch. Don't change anything about it. Click Next.

In the parameter selection window, leave the checkboxes as default. Click "Next".

Afterwards another installation window will appear. The Virtualbox installer will inform you that a new network connection will be created during the program installation process. This means that your main connection is temporarily disabled. Click “Yes”, then in the next window “Install”.

Wait while the application installs. Upon completion of the installation, a notification will appear regarding the successful completion of the Virtualbox installation process. Click Finish.

If everything was successful, “VirtualBox Manager” will start.

“Manager” is a shell that provides work between Virtualbox and a desktop PC. The range of options for this application is quite small. True, it’s not worth spending time reviewing them, since the program works with default settings that can satisfy most users.

How to add a new virtual machine?

To install a new virtual machine, select the “Create” option. Enter its name, select the type and version of the operating system. In our case, Windows XP.

In the new window, select the amount of RAM. Keep in mind that you will not be able to allocate more memory than is installed on your PC.

The next window will ask you to create a new virtual hard disk or use an existing one. Since this is our first launch. Since this is our first launch of the program, create a new one using the “Create a new virtual hard disk” option.

In the next window you need to specify the type of hard drive. We recommend leaving the VDI type, then your virtual disk will be completely synchronized with the virtual machine, and the speed at which it performs its functions will be no less than that of a real hard drive.

A dynamic virtual disk, the volume of which tends to change as information is added. It forms faster, but functions very slowly.

A fixed virtual hard drive, the volume of which will be static and will be designated by the size that was specified during creation. It takes longer to create, but works much faster.

Which type to choose is up to you. But in our example we will focus on the dynamic type.

Let's go to the next window. Here you need to enter the name of the disk, indicate its size and location.

Click on the “Create” button and a window with the newly created virtual machine will open in front of us. Actually, this concludes our preparatory actions.