I’m using Ubuntu 10.04.
I’ve been able to get Windows games to work via WINE, but its kind of glitchy.
Can I install VMWare on Ubuntu, and install WINXP within VMWare and run Windows programs that way? Anyone have any experiences with this? I’ve googled, and I tend to find people with a windows machine running Ubuntu in VMware, not the opposite.
You might try Crossover: Run Microsoft Windows software on Mac, Linux and ChromeOS | CodeWeavers
Like WINE (actually is wine), but more so.
Just dual-boot.
Wouldn’t it use less system resources to just have a dual boot of Ubuntu and WinXP? Seems to me just running xp alone would work better than running xp inside ubuntu. I don’t use my computer for games and ubuntu copes nicely with everything I need it for, but have a couple of friends who do play games and they both just have the option in the startup menu of which o/s they fancy.
Always makes me laugh though, Ubuntu’s startup time is about 20 seconds, windows vista about 10-15 minutes before it finishes loading all it’s crap and starts doing the inevitable updates.
Edit: Blast! beaten to the punch!
I’m running OpenSuse 11.3. I recently installed VirtualBox from the repositories and had a perfect replica of Windows 2000 which for non-games programs works exactly. Sadly, I can’t get Cossacks to run ( input devices don’t work ) although it installed perfectly.
Since others have got the same game working in VirtualBox, I think it’s the older computer at fault; however, one link states that one should install VB directly from Sun since there’s a difference in USB support; on the other hand he suggests games don’t work that well virtually anyway…
Still, I’ll keep trying; and may try VMWare at some point. I find it puzzling that any Windows users would use virtual linux, as Windows has better applications versus Linux’s being a superior OS: to use linux applications on Windows seems to get the worst of both worlds…
Well, to answer the OP - I (well, my wife) uses Sun VirtualBox on Ubuntu very successfully to run hardware specific software for her paper-cutter.
I’ve not actually had a go at setting up any games - Direct3D support is still experimental for both VMWare and VirtualBox (basically, the support software in the VM has to install a virtual Direct3D device driver that converts Direct3D calls into OpenGL calls supported by the Linux display driver - all this Direct3D-to-OpenGL code comes initially from the Wine project). YMMV based on the game and the video card/driver combo in Ubuntu. If Wine has not worked, it may be worth a crack, but dual-boot may be an easier route.
Also, your processor makes a difference. Some Intel and AMD chips support hardware CPU virtualization that is faster and smoother than non-hardware virtualization. Some manufacturers (Sony, in particular) have disabled this ability on CPUs that do support it. Other systems may require a BIOS change or update.
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Unless the game isn’t compatible with WINE, you’d probably have better chances using that. The only real bottleneck is the conversion from DirectX to OpenGL. I’d say games run at 80% speed, at average.
Just be sure to get the latest version, not the stable one. And you may want to use PlayOnLinux, which will automatically use the best configuration. At least check out the Application Database, which is not only a compatibility list, but also will likely tell you if you need to do anything special to make a program work.
Two different computers… Easy… Way I do it…
VMWare Player is free, and if you have a Windows disk, it’s easy to install. VMWare’s website offers the Player application totally for free with registration, and it’s easy to set up, and then you just install Windows onto your new VM.
It’s going to face a performance slowdown, though. Obviously there’s a penalty incurred for making the virtual environment, and you can’t allocate all of your processor speed and RAM to your VM, but if you’re worried primarily about games that aren’t recent and don’t have major hardware demands for good performance, you’ll very often get better results from running them in actual Windows than from fucking around with WINE.