Running Windows 8 from a virtual environment

In the last few days I had many questions about the “good” way to run Windows 8 developer preview from a Virtual Environment. It turns out the Windows engineering team wrote a blog post last friday about that.

The popular options are the following:

Functional:

  • Hyper-V in Windows 8 Developer Preview
  • Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008 R2
  • VMware Workstation 8.0 for Windows
  • VirtualBox 4.1.2 for Windows

Non-functional:

  • Microsoft Virtual PC (all versions)
  • Microsoft Virtual Server (all versions)
  • Windows 7 XP Mode
  • VMWare Workstation 7.x or older

If you’re running Windows 8 developer preview in a virtual environment you probably should also take a look at the Windows 8: Tips and Tricks for mouse/keyboard users article on WinRumors.

Finally if like me you a bit disoriented by the lack of the classic Windows menu in the desktop mode, you should now that if you press the Windows key and start typing using your keyboard it will actually start filtering applications and show you those which match your search.

Enjoy your Windows 8 time !

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