Which virtual machine is more stable/coded better?

[DeltrusDisc]

So I recently got a lot of new software for free through my college for being in CIT classes, and I got two different virtual machine apps and was wondering if one is significantly better than the other. For non-school-related tasks, I got XP Pro 32 bit to simply be able to play some of my favorite old games like AoE classic, X-Wing Alliance, and the X-Wing vs Tie Fighter series. I already downloaded Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 and installed XP onto that, though I'm already questioning the quality of it, based on this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...QE_FoXPs#t=51s

I linked to 51 seconds in, which is where you really start to hear some glitchy sound-effects and I was also having the game randomly speed up and slow down while playing it.

Now that I have VMWare Workstation 8, I am wondering if installing the XP Pro onto that would be a better idea. Is it a more stable software? Will it have these issues? Do these issues even have anything to do with the software or is it something else? I allocated 2GB of RAM to this virtual machine and told it to run XP at its highest settings possible, so I'm not sure. I'm getting the feeling Microsoft just didn't code as good of a virtual machine as VMWare did, however I have yet to try it out on Workstation.

Thoughts/opinions? I'm so new to VMs so that's why I'm coming to you guys. I will be installing VMWare Workstation anyways because my Linux class requires at-home work on Linux and command prompt in VMWare Workstation.

[Nellah]

Virtual PC isn't as feature rich as VMWare, if I recall. I use VMWare Player and have installed many Linux distros, most Windows versions from 3.11 through XP (and have a MS-DOS 6.22 VM built) and they seem to work just fine, including some 3D acceleration where supported (3DMark 2001SE runs just fine, though scores naturally very low.) Diablo II plays flawlessly on my XP VM.

[DeltrusDisc]

Perhaps I shall go ahead and do this. I hope that XP reinstalls fine without bitching at me. >_>

[Djinni]

Put it this way....

VMWare have based an entire business on Virtual Machines and virtual applications...
Microsoft did it as an addin as a cheap way to maintain compatibility and allow business users to upgrade to Windows Vista/7 from Windows 2000/XP etc...

Although from experience I much prefer VMPlayer/VMWorksation to any other virtualisation software. (VirtualPC, Virtual Box etc...)

[DeltrusDisc]

Put it this way....

Say no more, dear Djinni. You've sold me even more-so on VMWare. :P

[Cyanotical]

I use VMware player and ESXi at home, probably the best out there, Im not sure if Citrix offers a free player

[DeltrusDisc]

I knew you'd show up at some point Cyanotical. Currently installing my XP Pro on Workstation 8. Hope this works better!

[Cyanotical]

I knew you'd show up at some point Cyanotical. Currently installing my XP Pro on Workstation 8. Hope this works better!

It should, workstation is a more robust version of player, we use it at work for making thinapps

[DeltrusDisc]

I think I'll assume if AoE still acts up, it's just the game, idk. That would really suck though.

[DeltrusDisc]

Since we're on this topic...

I just chose VMWare to use the physical DVD drive, so I try booting up AoE: Gold and I get the following error:

D:\

Only part of a ReadProcessMemory or WriteProcessMemory request was completed.

I didn't have this issue in Virtual PC. O_o Any ideas? I've *never* seen this before.

[Deleted]

Everyone else has pretty much said the same thing - VMWare. Our company has recently switched to it from Microsoft's offering and it's just better.