Win4Lin Experiences

[RedAlpha3]

Reading through another thread, someone suggested using XP through Win4Lin. The impression I received was that the XP OS side would be more secure as it was running within Linux. I use XP for two programs and find them irreplaceable but cringe every time I boot from Linux to Windows (Dual boot system) as I'm plagued by updates, programs phoning home, etc. I suppose that I could disconnect the ethernet every time I boot into Windows but I'm inclined to think that Win4Lin Pro might well be a more elegant solution. Does anyone have any experience using this?

From what I've gleaned on the Win4Lin website it appears that the OEM version of XP is not supported.

[danieldk]

Using a virtual machine is more safe in the sense that it can easily be isolated from the net. Besides that, some virtual machines also allow you to make snapshots, giving the possibility to roll back to older snapshots. So, if you store your documents on your Linux system (IIRC Win4Lin gives an extra drive that is just a subdirectory in your home directory), and use snapshots.

I personally use the Parallels VM. It is very fast, supports more than just Windows (e.g., I use it to run Solaris and FreeBSD). Besides that it is relatively cheap at 49.95.

Win4Lin only support Windows. But for this reason they provide much more integration. Besides that, they support FreeBSD through Win4BSD :).

At any rate, you can just try it for a limited time installing the package. It will work for some time (IIRC 10 or 14 days), and requires a license number after that. The Debian package can be found here, as well as installation instructions:

ftp://ftp.win4lin.com/pub/releases/linux/pro/3.5/pkg

[danieldk]

I should add that Parallels offers a trial at:
http://www.parallels.com/en/download/workstation/

[RedAlpha3]

Thanks Daniel. Absolutely the information I wanted. Parallels looks quite straightforward too. Having to close down Mepis and then reboot XP has become a major irritation.

[AndreL]

Still, don't expect too much if your planning to play Windows games on these...

[RedAlpha3]

I'm not a games player so this is not a problem. I'm not sure I understand how Windows XP, once installed, will be activated! I have a feeling I will have to connect to the net to do this.

[danieldk]

I'm not a games player so this is not a problem. I'm not sure I understand how Windows XP, once installed, will be activated! I have a feeling I will have to connect to the net to do this.

Ah, yes. Sorry, I only have Windows 2000 ;). Of course, you could activate it, and then tweak the virtual machine network settings to avoid that a net connection is made. Usually there are two kinds of networking:

- Bridged networking: the virtual machine appears as an additional interface on the network. You could block this interface with iptables (I think).
- NAT/Host networking: the virtual machine builds a virtual network, and the host system (Linux) forwards packets to the real network. In this case you can usually disable IP forwarding in Linux, and the packets from the Windows virtual machine will not reach the net.

More details can (probably) be found in the guides.

[stafio]

I've been considering trying to run Windows from within Linux for a while now, but am not sure what method to use. Can anyone provide a quick summary of the differences between win4lin, vmware, and xen and any pros/cons associated with each?

Also, if anyone has tried any of these and has had good or bad experiences I'd like to hear about those.

[RedAlpha3]

So far, I've tested Parallels, Win4lin, and VMware. From a cursory glance, they all seem very similar though I have no real idea what is under the bonnet. They all use a virtual machine approach. Parallels would not accept the temporary registration key. It installed very easily but I have no way of testing with a guest OS. Win4Lin installed easily and installed te Windows XP easily too. Worked quite well but occasionally had a very jerky cursor. It warned that it did not support the oem version of XP which I possess. Vmware is very good. No problems whatsoever from an installation point of view.
The real difficulty with these lies in the Windoze side. The activation process and the quirks that introduces. Even though the OS would be on the identical system it had been taken from, it was not co-operative. I imagine that if you were installing another linux system or a BSD in a virtual machine there would be no dificulties.
Early days, but I like VMware the best by a long way. But, it is the most expensive.

[danieldk]

Parallels would not accept the temporary registration key.

I'd drop them a note, and ask if you can get a new key. For my uses it works as well as VMWare Workstation, for a third of the price.

[RedAlpha3]

Tried this, Daniel. Still waiting for an answer.

[chris_b]

I used to run Win4lin98 (as it is now called) back in the days of Libranet 2x and was very pleased with it. I have some electronics design programmes that won't run under Wine, and are not functionally replaceable by linux apps. I had to patch and recompile the kernel but there was a howto via the Win4lin forum that got me through that ok. Win4lin98 seemed to 'emulate' at about the DOS level and because W98 still had DOS hidden underneath it worked pretty well (no usb beyond hid and limited directx, but no big deal for me)

Then along came Libranet 3, which had a prepatched kernel and some help in the database ... Great I thought, but I never could get Win4lin to install again. I moved to Kanotix and never did summon up the energy to patch another already-patched kernel.

Then Win4lin went for the so-called Win4linPro so they could support XP; this seems to be qemu by another name. I guess they have licensed the kqemu accelerator as it would not run too quick without. Support for Win4lin98 then dried up - just look at the anguish on their forum as folks tried to get patched kernels either from win4lin or built themselves.

So I'm not going that route again. I've bought Parallels and its deb installed ok on my Kanotix linux system. I haven't done the windows install yet so I can't report further. A colleague has a MACbook with Parallels and it's fine

hth

Chris

[RedAlpha3]

Bit the bullet and bought Parallels. It is virtually (no pun intended!) identical to VMware and as Daniel pointed out, three times cheaper. Early days of experimenting but it appears to work very well. It will install onto a Mepis 6 linux with no difficulty though it needs to have the linux-headers for your specific kernel installed first. XP install is as straightforward as it ever is. Off to try installing PC_BSD onto it now!