Microsoft are set to formally unveil Windows 8 in just two days at their BUILD conference in California, but what are we expecting them to announce.  Some details of Windows 8 have already been unveiled but others are sketchy, concealed in mist so far.  So, settings aside what we actually know about the product so far, what are we expecting it to be, and what are expecting it will do for us?

The Kinect Connection

First and foremost Microsoft are pushing a new interface paradigm on the end user based primarily around the tablet / touch screen, but also the Kinect.  This is something that many people have missed so far.  A while ago now Microsoft showed off the new tablet interface, based on their Metro interface from the Zune / Windows Phone.  Most recently Windows Chief Steven Sinofsky implied that this would be the ‘default’ interface for Windows 8, with users dropping down to the traditional desktop should they want it.  No I’m going to wait and see just how true this is on Tuesday because it’s likely that the new tablet interface won’t be integrated any more deeply into Windows 8 than Media Centre currently is with Windows 7.

The exciting part of all this will be tight integration with the Kinect.  Microsoft’s biggest announcement, and probably their most impressive display on Tuesday will be this new tablet interface being operated on a standard desktop machine with a Kinect, possibly built into the bezel of a monitor.  This interface type has been sought after by geeks everywhere since Tom Cruise popularised it in Minority Report.  Microsoft have deliberately kept quiet about the Kinect integration with WIndows 8 but, you mark my words, this is will be a headline feature.

A new virtualization

Microsoft will take virtualization to the next level with Windows 8.  It’s already been leaked/announced that the Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate versions of the OS will include the company’s Hyper-V technology.  This will allow them to completely strip away all the legacy support that has been Windows’ achiles heel in terms of security and stability problems for years.

Where this will leave home users remains to be seen, but the inclusion of Windows 7 Mode will probably rectify this.  At the moment you need the professional version of Windows 7 or above to use XP Mode.  This isn’t something that’s going to change but XP will be out of support while Windows 8 is still in it’s active product cycle.  It’s very likely then that Microsoft will use it’s Hyper-V and MinWIn technologies to provide a downloadable, and completely locked-down copy of XP Pro SP3 (possibly even SP4 just for this virtual machine).  This and Windows 7 Mode will enable them to completely strip out all the legacy support, making Windows smaller, leaner, faster and far more secure.

Will Microsoft’s Share Price Dip?

Because of just these two things, which I am convinced will be the headline announcements on Tuesday, Windows 8 will alienate a huge number of computer users who like the traditional way of doing things, perhaps don’t want a new learning curve, and especially in business will be greatly concerned about the support for their legacy programs and how any new interfaces will play with their workplace productivity.

Suffice to say Windows 8 will be bold, a statement made by Steve Ballmer over a year ago.  There is every possibility that business users will turn away in frustration, at least initially, as they see the consumerisation of Windows take hold.  There will be concessions to them which will include tight integration with Microsoft Lync and Office 365, two more inevitable features and possible integration with Skype; though Microsoft’s purchase of the company came too late in the development process this time around.  But I suspect that Microsoft’s share price will probably dip on Tuesday as businesses take a step back to assess the impact of Windows 8 on their own bottom line.  This situation will soon rectify itself though and the share price will bounce back, and even rally further as businesses realise the full potential, especially with security, of Windows 8.

Windows 8 is indeed going to be bold, and I’d love to find out just how true you think my predictions here will be.  Please feel free to comment here.

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Windows 8 will be the first legacy-free version of Microsoft’s world-beating operating system, at least on its new form-factor, ARM-powered mobile devices.  Here there will be no support, at all, for any traditional Windows applications.  Everything will need to be recoded and rewritten for the new platform.  This will be a welcome break for many and, if Microsoft keep a tight grip on their app marketplace in the same way they do with Windows Phone, will help turn Windows into a truly virus-free platform.

Good news then.  Even better was the discovery of Microsoft’s Hyper-V virtualisation client in the 64-bit alpha builds of the OS.  The inclusion of this will enable true virtualisation of legacy software.  There are a great many questions to ask about this however.  We don’t know yet if this means legacy support will indeed be dropped from Windows 8.  There are many technical reasons preventing Hyper-V from working on the x86 (32-bit) Windows platform.

The, frankly, long list of questions we’re all waiting for Microsoft to answer today include…

• Will legacy support be dropped completely
• Will Hyper-V be the way to install and run all legacy apps
• Will there be a Hyper-V equivalent in the x86 builds or will there be XP Mode
• Will virtualisation support be built into all editions of Windows 8 or only some builds (i.e. Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate)

These are just a few of the more common questions.  But this is a subject that really matters as legacy support is Windows’ achiles heel.  It’s the reason why 60% of all Windows patches exist and it’s the reason why virus and malware writers are able to exploit vulnerabilities in the OS.  Indeed it’s the reason why those vulnerabilities exist in the first instance!

It all leaves questions over where home users will be with Windows 8.  Will they be able to use their existing software?  Will they still have the buggy legacy code in the OS?  Will any virtualisation options be simple for non-technical people to use.  The list goes on.

But what are the wider ramifications of dropping legacy support in Windows and what else could it mean for PCs going forward?  Let’s assume for a moment that you’re happy to drop legacy support.  That you don’t have any software or hardware that doesn’t work merrily in Windows 7 and that you’ve never needed to install XP Mode and may indeed never even have heard of it.

The broader implications of this then could turn out to be very good for you indeed.  We could, for instance, begin to see PCs shipping with keyboards that have finally dropped the extra keys required by the original IBM PC, three decades ago.  In this I mean the function keys and others such as Print Screen, Scroll Lock and Pause / Break.  Of these the only keys that are used these days are F1 (universally for help), F8 (when starting your PC for the boot options), Alt-Gr (for producing only about five foreign characters) and Print Screen (for getting screen grabs).

Most keyboards these days come with additional functions mapped onto these keys to adjust backlights, open your email, change the volume and so on.  What’s more there isn’t a single function used by these keys that isn’t easily mappable to another key combination, or that can be done away with completely.  For instance, simply pressing Alt + a letter could produce foreign letters, the B key could bring up boot options and the help button can be done away with completely.

The keyboard is just one example of where the dropping of legacy support in Windows can change other aspects of the PC ecosystem.  We also wouldn’t need much of the support we currently have in hardware (motherboards and processors for instance).  This would in time see a whole new generation of devices that were smaller and consumed much less power, because they didn’t need to be capable of so much.  Before too long, all PCs would be low-power devices with smaller footprints and tiny cases.  The distinction between Intel and Arm devices as we understand it today would be blurred to the point where we’d never be able to tell the difference from looking at them.

Overall there are far more benefits to Microsoft completely dropping legacy support from Windows natively, and hiving it all off to virtual machines that we might think.  This is a great future, one we can all look forward to and I can only hope we see the first signs of it soon.

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Virtual machine technology has been around for about 10 years now, with VMWare probably the best well known company to make virtualization software. Microsoft entered the field a few years ago and found that many users like the idea of a sandbox operating system, i.e. anoOperating system running inside another operating system, but one did not interfere with the other.

The most current version of an operating system at Microsoft is the Hyper V that is found on the Server 2008 R2 series.  But it has been revealed that Windows 8 will carry a virtualization feature as well.  This can be significant from a business perspective.

Consider that one of the biggest hold backs to any new operating system are the legacy programs that it may abandon. How long will Excel 2003 be supported? How long will Windows XP be supported? What about specific software programs that are written for an operating system, that is seeing it’s last legs? The program works, but only on that specific OS. With virtualization legacy concerns go away. The latest OS can have an earlier OS in place as well as the other programs.

Now with Windows 8, this feature will be part of the OS. At least that is what is being reported. But it makes sense. The underlying notion that any new software upgrade that happens will have many companies jumping to that is just not true. Besides costs, there are training issues, and software and hardware compatibility issues as well.  But at least the issue of software compatibility will not be a hold up.

Whether the deployment will be built in to Windows 8 or be a role is still not clear. In windows 2008 R2, the Hyper-V feature, which the virtualization, is a role. That means that you have to add it to add the program to the system, not a complete installation, rather it would be more like a component add on.

Source: ZDNet

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It’s long been suspected that Microsoft would include virtualisation technologies in Windows 8.  This is because the largest problem facing Windows is the need for legacy support, which can account for 80% of the latches and updates delivered to the operating system, and is also a major factor in some older software not working.  This is a particular problem in business where a considerable amount of legacy software is used.

Now Microsoft’s Server virtualisation client, Hyper-V, has been been found in the latest leaked build of Windows 8, confirming what many people suspected.

This virtualisation client will do away with the need for plug-in software such as Virtual PC or XP Mode as it means the operating system will support virtualised environments natively.  This could mean something even more pronounced for Windows 8 however.  ZD Net Mary Jo Foley wrote yesterday about a French Microsoft Security and Technical Director who outlined a scenario in which almost all Windows 8 applications would run in a virtualised environment.

The advantages of this approach would be immense.  For starters this means that Microsoft would be able to completely do away with support for legacy applications in the OS and, possibly all the underlying code in the operating system that also support it.  It’s this code that requires the huge number of Windows Updates we currently get every month.

It also means that, we knew this bit already, a virtual machine of Windows 7 would be included with the OS, known as Windows 7 Mode.  It’s possible that XP Mode will also be included.

If Microsoft are sensible, and the inclusion of Hyper-V into Windows 8 seems to indicate that they are.  These legacy operating systems could well be locked-down so that they require neither anti-virus software or updates as XP Mode does at the moment.  This is the single largest problem with XP Mode currently.

The alternative it to find a way to plug these virtual machines into Windows Update so that all of them are updates simultaneously.  This would actually increase the total number of updates received under Windows 8, but if the VMs required updating, it would be the most sensible way to do it.

The benefits of incorporating software virtualisation into Windows 8 are enormous, the core Windows 8 code is much smaller, leaner and fitter and massively more stable and secure.  All the problems are shoved off into easily configurable virtual machines.  The downside is that anybody using these features would essentially have two, perhaps even three, core operating systems to update and maintain.

This is a headache Microsoft needs to make sure that people don’t get as it might well turn people off using the new OS in small business or home environments if they see configuring and updating it to be too much of a chore.  After all, Windows 7 is now good enough for most people.

It’s likely that we could expect to only see the Hyper-V system in x64 versions of Windows 8 as the system is currently only available on 64-bit processors for Windows Server, and has not yet been seen in x86 leaks of Windows 8.  This could essentially leave the x86 version of Windows, which are now in sharp decline anyway, without any legacy software support.

The proper implementation of virtualisation technologies though would make an already extremely secure operating system even more so, by vastly reducing the surface area for attack.  We could then expect to see Windows overtake other operating systems including OS X and GNU/Linus to become the most secure operating system on the planet.  Now that would certainly be an interesting day.

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One of the biggest problems with migrating to a new version of Windows is moving all your software to the new operating system as well.  Nowhere was this more apparent than with the move to Windows 7, which for many is still ongoing.    Windows 7 is far more compatible than its predecessor, Vista, but it has to be because one of the largest plus points about Windows (also one of its biggest failings, but I’ll come to that shortly) is its backwards compatibility with apps.

Microsoft released XP mode shortly after Windows 7, a fully-licensed copy of XP Professional with Service Pack 3 running in a virtual machine on the Windows 7 desktop.  Initially though this would only run on PCs with hardware virtualisation supported by the processor and motherboard.  A few months later Microsoft tweaked the code to allow XP Mode to run on any computer, but again it’s limited to those running Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate.

This doesn’t help you port your applications to Windows 7 though as you still need to reinstall them.  There are third-party programs such as zInstall that allow you to do this, but Windows badly needs a option to do this by default.

This would include an option during the installation of the operating system where  by you could perform an upgrade that would take your existing copy of Windows, say XP, and virtualise it in the Windows installer.  You’d need an external hard disk or a second hard disk or partition to do this as you’d need lots of extra disk space, but there’s no reason why Microsoft can’t allow you to turn an existing Windows installation, complete with software and (optionally files) into a VM that will run in the same way that XP Mode does.

But the lack of such a feature means that Windows has to soldier on with legacy software support and XP Mode.  I mentioned earlier that legacy software support is one of Windows’ biggest failings.  This is because some 80% of all patches and updates for the operating system exist to patch problems in, or caused by, this legacy support.  A clean break is what’s needed and it’s looking very unlikely that the next version of Windows will offer the legacy upgrade options that we all so badly need.

This leaves us with the sometimes tricky option of running our older version of Windows in a virtual machine.  While XP Mode is good for some, if you’re running Windows 7 Home Premium or another unsupported version then you’re stuck with Microsoft Virtual PC.  You can install XP in this, but can you then get it to work?

I got an email this week from a reader who had exactly this problem.  He had an old Dell computer running Windows XP but had upgraded to a new machine, also a Dell, and had installed his original copy of XP into Virtual PC running under Windows 7 on the new computer.  When he’d come to activate it though he was met with failure and no number of calls to either Dell or Microsoft Activation support was helping.

This problem was caused by his XP licence being an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) copy.  Unlike retail copies of Windows this was licensed only for a single, specific machine and when it came time to install it was looking for markers in the BIOS to tell it what machine it was running on.  Because Virtual PC appears to the OS to be a specific combination of hardware it wouldn’t activate.

If he instead had owned a retail copy of XP he wouldn’t necessarily have had a problem as these copies allow you to transfer the licence from one machine to another when you upgrade your hardware.  He was royally stuffed then.

Even if he had got a retail copy of XP though he still might have hit problems as some copies of Windows; and this can vary depending on whether you bought it retail, and what version, or whether you got it from a subscription service such as the Microsoft Action Pack, simply aren’t licensed to operate in the VM and won’t activate.

This leaves many people running older software out in the cold.  Sometimes their only option is to buy another copy of their old Windows from a computer fair or online, and sometimes they have to shell out more money for expensive virtualisation software that will do the job for them.  This isn’t always an option for people.

Microsoft really need to do better at helping those with older software, particularly some they may no longer have the original install disc for, to migrate that software when they buy a new PC.  Until then these problems, sadly, will continue to occur.

If you have a Windows troubleshooting problem you’d like to email me about, feel free to do so at mike@MVPs.org as I’m always happy to help where I can.

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Microsoft’s latest patch Tuesday fixes somehow managed to break the connection for many users using VMware to run Windows 7 in a virtual enviornment.

VMware is used by a lot of people to run Windows 7 in a virtual environment, be it on a computer or a server. Many people are on the fence as to whether or not they should adopt this virtualization technique in the workplace. This recent issue with a Windows update isn’t boding well for it.

According to the VMware knowledge base there had been a conflict with two security bulletins issued for Windows 7, causing disruptions for VMware’s View Client and creating connection failures for users attempting to access the View Client Server.

VMware then investigated the issue further and found that two Microsoft patches 2482017 (a cumulative security update for Internet Explorer), and 2467023 (an update to address an issue with the handling of system binaries in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 systems) were responsible for the connection issues.

Microsoft released both of these updates as part of Microsoft’s Patch Tuesday last week, and the problem affects both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of  Windows 7 running VMware View.

In fairness to VMware this wasn’t there fault, but regardless they got straight onto the issue and posted an advisory on its site to let users get over this issue.

• Users who have already installed the patches can either upgrade to VMware View Client build 353760, or they can uninstall the two Microsoft patches (probably not a good idea, though, since the patches fix a security vulnerability).
• And VMware also recommended that if the newest Microsoft security updates had not yet been installed, users should download and install the View Client patch before updating their Windows 7 machines with Microsoft’s security fixes.

VMware say they’ve been closely working with Microsoft since Windows 7 has been released to ensure that no issues like this occur. However according to Pat Lee, director of clients and end-user computing at VMware, this update included features of Windows 7 Service Pack 1 which wasn’t due to be released until February 22nd and that’s what caused the issue.

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While information about Windows 8 remains almost non-existent, blogger Mary-Jo Foley has reported some interesting slides that tend to indicate that windows 8 will feature your “desktop as a service”.

So what does this mean?  Well it’s a strong pointer towards more virtualisation support for the desktop OS.  Already Windows 7 allows you to boot into a VM containing a copy of Windows 7 Enterprise or Ultimate just as you would book into a normally installed copy of Windows.  I’ve done this and you simply cannot tell that you’re working inside a virtual machine.

The virtual desktop takes things one step further with applications and data being centrally managed and “delivered” to your computer rather than being explicitly installed on it.

There’s precious little information at the moment but it’s been clear for a while that more virtualisation would be key to Windows 8 (referred to in the slides as Windows Next) and it’s also worth noting that a great many future features for Windows products never make it past, or even into, the beta.

It’s an interesting concept though to allow complete virtualisation of an OS, especially where stability and compatibility issues are concerned.  Microsoft should be applauded for taking this issue so seriously for the next version of Windows.

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Windows 7 has been a major success for Microsoft, mainly in the home and consumer market, but it’s also doing much better in the business sector than its predecessor Windows Vista. However, there are still many organizations to make the switch from Windows XP due to their reliance on old legacy applications that just aren’t compatible on the newer Windows 7 operating system.

Microsoft has a new tool, MED-V which it hopes will help IT admins to make the transition to Windows 7.

MED-V is short for Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization. MED-V, along with APP-V (Application Virtualization), makes up the virtualization framework of the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP). This week, Microsoft announced the availability of the public beta for MED-V 2.0.

It all sounds fairly complicated but desktop virtualization is the key to crossing the gap between the legacy OS and the new Windows 7 platform. It’s the easiest and most straightforward solution to this problem that’s prevalent with every new operating system. It allows you to migrate to Windows 7, and take advantage of all its features and benefits, while at the same time you can still run your older programs on it in a virtualized environment.

MED-V2.0 allows USB devices and Smartcards to be shared between host and virtual environments with little or no effort. Access to My Documents is redirected from within the virtual desktop so applications behave exactly as they do in the host system. It’s well implemented and you wouldn’t even think your effectively running two operating systems at once.

For IT admins, MED-V provides all the tools needed to deploy, provision, control, and monitor virtual desktops throughout the company. Usage permissions and Virtual PC settings can also be configured centrally, and tools are provided to facilitate troubleshooting and diagnosis of virtual PCs.

Here’s Microsofts word on it

If you have legacy Windows XP or Internet Explorer 6/7 applications that are slowing down your Windows 7 deployment plans, don’t let them stand in your way. The MED-V team has worked hard to ensure MED-V 2.0 is easy for IT professionals to deploy and manage and seamless for end-users to use.

So IT admins who have yet to upgrade to Windows 7, this could be the tool you’re looking for

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Server 2008 R2 has the Hyper-V technology, which allows multiple computers via their operating systems to be run simultaneously on one computer. They are, of course, hosted through Server 2008. The use of virtual machines has been one of the quiet innovations that may be ready to explode into the public mainstream.

Virtual machine software has been around for several years. It is a computer inside a computer. With VM software you can run Windows XP, Server 2003, Vista, Windows 7, all side by side in a sandbox frame and not interfere with one another. You can create networks inside a hosting computer. In fact you can even do it now with Windows 7. But that leads us to Windows 8.

Windows 8

The first question is, what will Windows 8 look like? Well if Server 2008 is any indication about how it changed from Server 2003, don’t be surprised if Windows 8 doesn’t look like Windows 7. Why should it? If you want Windows 7, get Windows 7. So, then it has to look and be different. that is where virtualization comes in.

With the talk about the new type of chips that will run Windows 8; maybe it will be a 128 bit OS, running on a 128 bit CPU, so Window8 will have not just new chip technology but it will have a different OS structure.

So virtualization will provide a new, radically new approach to delivering programs to users. One thing that virtualization can do is run programs simultaneously. True that occurs now with multiple OS’s in existence. That is what a “Window” is. However, most of the time, the CPU is idle. And as you add additional cores, which are designed to improve performance, you make more programs run simultaneously. The improved technology is running far ahead of the software implementations.

Consider this, most applications have not been re-written to take advantage of 64 bit OS processing, or the 64 bit processor. Re-writing the programs will be costly and many software designers, following the cliche “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” will be reluctant to re-write their successful programs. So you have very powerful computers that can run many applications but don’t have the use of their technology to its fullest. However, with virtualization, the programs do not have to be re-written, and the CPU’s will be pushed to their limit. With multiple OS’s running the different programs, then the CPU’s will be running at full capacity.

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If cost is any indication about how and when to move to a new technology, saving 3 to 4 million dollars over the next few years would be incentive enough. So CH2M HILL, a Fortune 500 company and a leader in engineering, management, procurement, construction, and operations, switched to Microsoft virtualization and management software with Hyper-V away from VMware Inc.

According to Microsoft, between 2005 and 2007, the company used VMware ESX to virtualize 350 servers in its datacenter and 100 servers in regional offices. When the global economy lost traction in 2007, CH2M HILL decided that it needed a more cost-effective virtualization solution.

Why Virtualization?

Essentially it offers at the very least the opportunity to save on hardware expenses. Instead of buying 10 servers and 10 software licenses, you can buy 1 physical server, and the software licenses to run 10 virtual machines. Do the math. If one server costs about $4,000, then 10 would be $40,000. Add $500 to $1000 for the operating system license and the software packages you could be looking at about 10,000 for the software including the OS. It could be as much as $50,000.

Hyper-V Image

Instead, you spend $4,000 on a server and 10,000 on the software, or $14,000.

That’s how CH2M HILL saw it. But apparently, Hyper-V, Microsoft’s version with comes with Server 2008  was less expensive than VMWare. Here is their take:

“The company was cutting costs across the board, and we wanted to push forward with virtualizing more servers, especially in our field offices, but we just couldn’t do it with VMware,” said Greg Barton, senior analyst, Enterprise Systems Group, CH2M HILL. “By switching to Microsoft from VMware, we will save $280,000 in software fees. Plus, we can now afford to tackle our 600 field servers and are aiming to virtualize 20 percent of these computers each year. At $5,000 a server, that’s a savings of $3 million over the next three to five years.”

VMWare

Indeed, Virtualization will certainly be a product alternative, especially if the power of the servers can increase, making the virtualization not only affordable, but allows companies to maintain productivity in that environment.

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Recently there have been rumours that the next version of Windows will move the whole platform completely over to 128-bit architecture, dumping 32 and 64-bit compatibility completely.

This first came about because of a news story broken by Microsoft Kitchen a few days ago in which Robert Morgan, a senior research and development officer at Microsoft posted the following on his LinkedIn profile.

Experience
Senior Research & Development
Microsoft
Public Company; MSFT; Computer Software industry

January 2002 – Present (7 years 10 months)

Working in high security department for research and development involving strategic planning for medium and long-term projects. Research & Development projects including 128bit architecture compatibility with the Windows 8 kernel and Windows 9 project plan. Forming relationships with major partners: Intel, AMD, HP and IBM.

Since then the sweaty masses have, frankly let their imaginations run away with themselves so I thought we needed to look at the situation more objectively, fact by fact.

It’s true that AMD and Intel are working on 128-bit chips, this is something that’s been out there for a while now.  But Windows 8 can’t possibly be 128-bit only.  The reasons for this are as follows.

Windows 7 is still, sadly, saddled with 32-bit compatibility.  This is despite the fact that almost every modern processor supports true 64-bit computing.  This is purely to maintain compatibility with older software (primarily in Microsoft’s most important market, business).  XP Mode, the virtualisation plug-in that allows you to run older software in a licensed copy of XP, goes some way towards addressing this and many people are hoping that 32-bit support will be dropped from Windows 8 completely.  Sadly though, it can’t happen.

This is because in order for XP Mode to work you need hardware virtualisation support on the motherboard and nowhere near enough motherboards yet support this.  By the time Windows 8 comes out it’s possible that all motherboards will, but Microsoft have to get started on Windows 8 code now, and they can’t guarantee this will happen.

It is for exactly the same reasons why Windows 8 can never be 128-bit only.  By the time the technology is mature enough Windows 8 will be ready to launch but the cost of the chips will still be extremely expensive.  They will, I predict, only be used in server farms for hard-core virtualisation tasks on servers.

It’s much more likely that Windows 8 Server will offer full support for 128-bit architecture and that the feature will then be ported to the business and consumer editions of Windows for Windows 9.

The move to 128-bit in itself isn’t such a big job, but it becomes a nightmare when you consider that you also have to maintain compatibility with 32-bit applications.  I can’t foresee a situation where we can have an operating system that supports 32, 64 and 128-bit code simultaneously while still remaining stable.  The only reason that Windows 8 Server could support it is because the 32-bit legacy support has already been dropped from Windows 7 Server.

For all the people who want to see 128-bit support in Windows 8, forget it.  Frankly you wouldn’t get any benefit from it at all anyway.  No software will be written to support it for years to come, full 64-bit support in software is only beginning to appear now, and it will offer the average user or gamer no additional benefits over the 64-bit architecture you already have.

Unless and until the whole computing experience we use in our daily lives demands a move to such technology, it will remain in the server farms of the future.

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I was thinking the other day about how I really don’t need to upgrade my PC this year.  It’s now getting on for three years old and, with the exception of a RAM upgrade last Christmas, still has no problems running all my software and starting up swiftly and trouble-free.

Thinking on, PC hardware hasn’t really moved on too much since I built it.  It has a 2.66GHz Core 2 Duo and 4Gb of DDR2 1066MHz memory, while the motherboard, an Asus P5K is still on sale, something of a surprise for a motherboard.

What’s more the prices of these components haven’t dropped noticeably since I bought them, and the current high-end parts like quad core processors are still luxury items.

The reason for this is that what I’ve got, and what most people are still buying is perfectly good enough for today’s needs.  What’s more, with Windows 7 running faster than Vista and requiring less demanding hardware, I can’t see this situation changing.

The uses an ‘average’ PC are put to haven’t changed much in the last five years, with the emphasis being placed on the speed of your broadband connection, not the PC itself.

By the time Windows 8 debuts we’ll have six and eight core processors and DDR3 ram will be the order of the day, but to my mind they’ll still be expensive compared to what you need to have a happy computing experience in the home or office.  What I’m using today will still be on sale.

So will hardware development stagnate under Windows 7?  Certainly not.  I expect to see smarter hardware in the future with a great emphasis placed on power consumption.  The introduction of XP Mode and the rise of virtualisation will no doubt only be the beginning of Microsoft pushing manufacturers to include motherboard hardware virtualisation as standard.  Let’s face it, until all new motherboards come with support for hardware virtualisation, we’re all saddled with legacy code, unstable systems and oodles of unwanted patches and updates.

Three years from now you won’t be able to buy the P5K motherboard I’m sure, but the motherboards you will be buying won’t be much different from what I already have inside my PC, they’ll just be smarter.

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Earlier I made a post on how to create and configure a VHD along with explaining exactly what a VHD was. This is a continuation of that article.

Another great feature of Windows 7 is the ability to actually install Windows 7 to a VHD, virtualization without any of the disadvantages of virtualization (full hardware support and so forth). This guide is about how to use the RTM (should work with the RC) DVD to install Windows 7 to a VHD created during installation (or you can use one created during my earlier guide).

I also mentioned the power of this ability earlier, as I listed a possible scenario:

Windows 7′s VHD support will give users the ability to install any operating system that supports booting from a VHD into a VHD. For example, a user could have Vista installed on a single partition, and then have three files (VHDs) anywhere on that disk (or for that matter, on any partition that is readable by Windows) and be able to boot different versions of Windows 7. Assuming that SP1 and SP2 were released (which they are not yet available), a user could hypothetically have four operating systems on a single partition (the number is only limited by the bootloader, four is actually just a random number selected), like so:

• Vista installed on a primary partition (such as “C:”).
• Windows 7 RTM installed within a VHD (such as “C:Windows7.vhd”).
• Windows 7 SP1 installed within another VHD (such as “C:Windows7SP1.vhd”).
• Windows 7 SP2 installed within yet another VHD (such as “C:Windows7SP2.vhd”).

Of course, the number of VHDs is virtually unlimited, but it’s quite easy to see the hype associated with VHDs in Windows 7.

Now, how would a user get about to actually performing an install of Windows 7 to a VHD?

Take note that this guide will also work with Windows Server 2008 R2.

1. Boot from the Windows 7 DVD.

2. Click past the Language Selection screen.

3. When you’re on the Install Now screen (with the “Install Now” button), stop. Click “SHIFT+F10″ to launch the Command Prompt (don’t bother going through Repair and all that – this is the right way).

4. First, let’s take a look at the drive letters currently mounted. Type in “fsutil fsinfo drives” and hit enter. This will list all drives (you should know what your drive letters are). Take note of all drive letters.

5. Now,we need to open “DISKPART.” To do, simply type in “diskpart” and click enter. Pretty easy.

6. When “DISKPART> ” appears, DISKPART is loaded.

7. If you want to just use an existing VHD (such as one created in the method I wrote about earlier), then use these two commands (of course C can be swapped out with any drive letter, but either way, you will need to specify the exact path):

   select vdisk file=C:pathtovhdfile.vhd
   attach vdisk

   If you are using an existing VHD, skip to the next step; otherwise, if you would prefer to simply create a new VHD, then use this format of commands (the max option specifies the file size, here I have roughly 6GB, increase as preferred):

   create vdisk file = c:pathtovhdfile.vhd max=6000
   select vdisk file = c:pathtovhdfile.vhd
   attach vdisk
   exit

8. Now run “fsutil fsinfo drives” again. A new drive letter should have appeared, this is your new VHD. Take note of the drive letter (this isn’t necessary – just making sure everything went OK).

9. Type “exit” again and hit enter. This will close the Command Prompt.

10. Click “Install Now” and go through the install as usual, making sure to select the “Custom” option when it appears.

11. When you come to the list of partitions and you are asked to choose an install location, ignore any warnings and select the partition that matches the size that you used for your VHD.

12. Windows 7 will automatically configure your boot loader for the VHD, but this is easily fixed. Just continue as normal, and when the installation completes and it prepares to reboot, it will show you the bootloader (should have two “Windows 7″ options if you already had a Windows 7 install, this is normal). Select either OS and continue (just make sure that it’s a Windows 7).

13. Now, if you are fine with the way the bootloader appears, you can quit now. Otherwise, you can follow this guide and use the bcdedit command-line tool (really easy, only three commands) or download EasyBCD and use that to do this yourself. However, I suggest using bcdedit and making your bootloader a little more clear (Again, you can opt for EasyBCD if you prefer a graphical menu). open the Command Prompt as an Administrator (right click and select “Run As Administrator”).

14. Type in “bcdedit /v” and hit enter. This will display a list of entries in the Windows 7 bootloader.

15. Determine the VHD install and copy the GUID (listed as identifier) and create a new command like the following (replacing GUID with your identifer (should be a really long set of numbers with hyphens – include all of it)):

    Take note that you can edit the description as you wish. This is what will appear in the bootloader.

    bcdedit /set {GUID} description “Windows 7 (VHD)”

16. If you want your VHD install to appear last (or second) in the bootloader, then execute this (again, replacing GUID):

    bcdedit /displayorder {GUID} /addlast

Now, enjoy your new Windows 7 install. Feel free to leave a comment or ask questions in the comments.

How to Install Windows 7 to a VHD was posted on Everything Microsoft - Latest Microsoft News, Guides, Reviews & Themes. If you are not reading this content in an email newsletter, it is being used without permission.