Friday, February 18, 2011

Features removed in Windows Virtual PC

It is never too late to complain about lost functionality. While Windows Virtual PC did add some nifty new features like RemoteApp, multithreading and USB support, it also took out plenty of existing features of Virtual PC 2007 for no reason at all which Virtual PC users are still unhappy about:

 The Virtual Machine console is replaced by an integrated ''Virtual Machines'' shell folder. Several options from the console have been removed such as ''Restore at start'', CPU time performance settings, muting sound in inactive virtual machines, full-screen resolution related options, configuring the host key, mouse capture options and settings for requiring administrator permissions.
 There is no official guest support for operating systems earlier than Windows XP Professional.
 Drag-and-drop file sharing between the guest and the host is not possible.
 Sharing of folders between host and guest operating system is not possible. Only volumes may be shared between operating systems.
 The ability to commit changes stored in Undo disks upon turning off virtual machines is gone from the VM turn off dialog. Doing so is now only possible through the VM's Settings dialog.
 The ability to use physical and virtual parallel ports has been removed.
 The user interface for using virtual floppy disks has been removed. Virtual floppy disk functionality, however, is still supported and may be accessed using a script.
 Virtual PC additions for guest operating systems no longer supported have been removed. However, you can install Virtual Machine Additions from an older Microsoft virtualization product for some guest OSes:
   • DOS VM Additions
   • Windows 98/Me VM Additions
   • Windows 2000 VM Additions
 Properties of the Virtual Machine like Guest OS, processor, processor features, video mode, Video RAM, code cache, IDE controller reads and writes, ethernet reads and writes, video frame rate and command line options can no longer be viewed.

This list also exists on Wikipedia (contributed by myself) but I am replicating it here because unsourced material on Wikipedia howsoever accurate it may be is often removed.

No comments: