Newsletter Archives

• Is virtualization right for you?

  Posted on August 12, 2024 at 02:42 CDT by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  ON SECURITY

  

  By Susan Bradley

  With any major change from one OS version to another, such as the leap from Windows 10 to 11, I determine whether to keep the old version around, just to run an application that hasn’t yet made the leap.

  I could keep an old PC on hand with the older OS and app. That might be useful if the older app has a more useful feature than the new version. It’s probably easier to do this in a business setting, where holding on to an old PC is less disruptive, but even home users can keep older technology if they’ve got the space.

  The alternative is to create a virtual machine (VM) on the new PC — one that runs the old OS and thus the older app.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.33.0, 2024-08-12).

  On Security Disk2vhd, Hyper-V, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Virtual Machines, Virtual PC, VirtualBox, VMWare, Windows Sandbox

• How to safely test-drive Win11 on your current PC, for free!

  Posted on December 6, 2021 at 02:44 CST by Fred Langa • Comment in the Forums

  LANGALIST

  

  By Fred Langa

  The anticipated flood of Win11-occasioned fixes and updates has begun: Microsoft, hardware makers, and software publishers are all scrambling to correct the problems encountered with the original Windows 11 release.

  I think the signs point to a somewhat premature release of Win11, as if Microsoft had skipped or shortened testing of the final “Release Candidate” version, shipping the software before it was adequately vetted in real-world conditions.

  But the fixes are arriving, including work by Microsoft and Oracle to release a 100% free, preconfigured, Win11 Pro virtual PC for testing and evaluation! Read on to see how to use it to safely set up a Win11 test drive on your current PC, plus more on Fred’s early Win11 experiences.

  Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.47.0 (2021-12-06).

  LangaList LangaList, Newsletters, Virtual PCs, VirtualBox, Windows 11

• Making an old PC virtually immortal

  Posted on February 17, 2020 at 01:05 CST by Tracey Capen • Comment in the Forums

  VIRTUAL PCS

  By TB Capen

  If you’ve spent years building, repairing, and managing PCs, you’ve probably accumulated a veritable junkyard of old PCs and parts — some still working, some not so much.

  For most of my computing career, my standard practice for disposing of obsolete (at least to me) machines has been to remove the hard drive and donate or recycle everything else. Then, once I’ve gone through the drive and archived important information elsewhere, I’ll typically wipe it and add it to my pile of empty-but-still-functional drives.

  Occasionally, I’ll attach a spare drive to a PC via a USB-to-hard drive connector (more info) to archive files or move really big chunks of data from machine to machine.

  Sometimes, however, I prefer to keep a system as it was originally intended — with a working operation system, applications, and data. And the best way I know to do that without having a bunch of boxes sitting by my desk is to transfer the full setups into virtual machines.

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 17.7.0 (2020-02-17).

  Virtual PCs AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Recycling systems, VirtualBox