VMWare 4.5

Boot time: 1 min 40 sec.
CPU Usage: 1%
Network: Could not get the adapter drivers installed.
Usage is obviously slower than on a physical machine, but not too bad.

VPC2004

Boot time: 4 min 45 sec.
CPU Usage: 85%
Network: Worked fine.
Usage is so bad that I can see the Start Menu rendering when clicked on.


Conclusion:  If you really want to run Windows Vista Beta 1 in a virtual machine and don't care about the network adapter, I'd go with VMWare byfar.

I burned the ISO to a DVD+R but you can mount it to a drive letter on the host OS. (Virtual PC does not support ISO images over 2.2GB so the mount must be on the host OS.)

Create a new Virtual PC.  I used 256MB RAM and 16GB virtual hard drive.

Boot from the DVD or host os mounted image.

Click "Install Now".

Since the Windows Vista Beta 1 installer does not support RAW drives (ie. virtual hard drives) you must do the following:
See the Readme file for more details.  (However I was able to install it on VMWare without a problem.)

Press Shift-F10 to get a command prompt.  (I wasn't able to get Shift-F10 to work until after I selected "Install now".)

Type DISKPART at the command prompt to start the diskpart tool.

Type the following commands in diskpart:

select disk 0
create partition primary
select volume 1
format fs=ntfs label="windows vista"

Type EXIT to exit diskpart.

Reset the virtual pc via the Virtual PC Console window.

When you reboot an install, the partition will be ready to be selected.


Total install took 3 hours.  Compared to 1 hour with VMWare (see link). (I did use a little less memory in VPC, could that be why?)

Keywords:  Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 VPC2004 VPC 2004 Longhorn Microsoft Vista Beta 1 OS

Do you remember spending countless hours on operating systems that are no longer around, or are at least no where to be seen?

I ran across this website a while back and thought I would share. :)

To reminisce about your favorite forgotten OS' click here.

You might notice that after installing an ASP, ASP/VB6, or ASP.NET application, you get undesired results under oracle client driver versions Oracle9i Release 2 (9.2.0.x.x) and Oracle10g Release 1 (10.1.0.x.x).

This is due to an Oracle install bug dealing with file permissions.

 

 Due to a bug (see Note:215255.1) of Oracle installation on XP, you have to execute the following bug-fix:

 Solution Description -------------------- Oracle 9.2 Client software requires that you give the Authenticated User privilege to the Oracle Home by following these steps:

 1. Log on to Windows as a user with Administrator privileges.

 2. Launch Windows Explorer from the Start Menu and and navigate to the ORACLE_HOME directory.

 3. Right-click on the ORACLE_HOME folder and choose the "Properties" option from the drop down list. A "Properties" window should appear.

 4. Click on the "Security" tab on the "Properties" window.

 5. Click on "Authenticated Users" item in the "Name" list (on Windows XP the "Name" list is called "Group or user names").
 
 6. Uncheck the "Read and Execute" box in the "Permissions" list (on Windows XP the "Permissions" list is called "Permissions for Authenticated Users"). This box will be under the "Allow" column.
 
 7. Check the "Read and Execute" box. This is the box you just unchecked.
 
 8. Click the "Apply" button.
 
 9. Click the "OK" button.
 
 10. Reboot your computer after these changes have been made. Re-execute the application and it should now work.

VMWare Workstation 4.5.2

1. Start VMWare Workstation.
2. Select menu item: File -> New Virtual Machine...
3. Choose a Typical Configuration, Microsoft Windows, Longhorn (experimental).
4. Choose your network connection.  (I chose Bridged)
5. Choose disk capacity.  (I chose 20GB, unallocated)
6a. Insert your Microsoft Vista Beta 1 DVD disc and boot from the dvd.
OR
6b. Mount the MSDN ISO as the CD drive.

During the installation the video color depth is 4 bits resulting in color dithering making it difficult to read text on the screen.
Installation seemed to lock up a couple times where the mouse cursor would not moved for about a minute or so, but it recovered fine.

After the 1st reboot (there are 2) during the installation which occurs when the progress bar is about 50%, the progress bar becomes more of an activity bar so you can't guage how much longer the install will take.
From the start of the install it took 1 hour until the 2nd reboot, which finally boots into Window Vista.
After the system has rebooted, the Supplemental Driver Pack Installation Wizard runs... which for ended with "Drivers are unavailable for your devices."

Install VMWare Tools
 Do not install install the VMWare Tools from the VMWare Workstation VM menu as it does not work.
 You must edit the Virtual Machine Settings and mount the windows.iso cd image to a vm cd drive.
 
 VXMNet will fail to install, and although there are descriptions on how to fix this for version 5.0, I have not resolved the issue with 4.5.2.

 Once you reboot your video will be much better but you still don't have network or sound.
 
 I was not able to get the network driver to work even on a manual install so I don't know that 4.5.2 support it.
 

If you are using 5.0, here is a link on getting it to work:

Total installation took just over an hour on my pc.