The following is a Plus Edition article, written by and copyright by Dick Eastman.
On November 4, I published a Plus Edition article entitled (+) A Computer for All Operating Systems. That article is still available at http://eogn.com/wp/?p=22813. A Plus Edition user name and password is required to read it. I described how I now use one computer to simultaneously run Windows 8, Macintosh OS X, Linux, and Android operating systems. In fact, it will run even more operating systems, if I wish, such as Windows 7, Windows XP, MS-DOS, OS/2, BeOS, UNIX, and still others.
I am delighted with the results and am using my new computer to write
this article. However, the solution I used is a bit expensive. A couple
of newsletter readers asked if there is a more cost-effective method
of accomplishing the same thing. The answer is, "Yes, you can
accomplish MOST of the same things for significantly less money,
although not everything will be available. In many cases, you can
create the new system using hardware and software you already own, plus some free software,
meaning no additional expense. Depending upon your needs, the low-cost
method may or may not accomplish what you want. It will operate a
shorter list of multiple operating systems simultaneously.”
Also, the lower-cost method will operate on standard PC hardware. That is, it should operate on any standard computer designed to run Windows. You might already have everything you need. However, I would caution you to try this only on computers with moderately fast processors, probably at least four gigabytes of RAM memory (more would be better), and sufficient hard drive space to store two or more operating systems plus all your data.
The new system will allow all operating systems and all applications to share network connections as well as all common peripherals, such as printers, external USB disk drives, flash drives, and more.
You may use this method to try out other operating systems on your computer without disturbing the existing setup. Or, if you have upgraded to a newer operating system, you can create a virtual machine of your previous operating system and use it to run older programs that aren’t supported in your new operating system. Or if you want to run multiple versions of the same software (like Photoshop CS4 and Photoshop CS5), you can install one of them on your main OS and the other inside a virtual machine.
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