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How to install Windows 8 as Virtualbox's (Virtual) Machine?

Is it better to install Linux as a second OS on a Windows machine, or Windows as the second OS on a Linux Machine?

  • By "Windows machine", I mean a laptop that came with Windows preinstalled. If particular versions or distributions of the OS influence this greatly, feel free to be specific.

  • Answer:

    From my experience, there's NO REASON to use "dual boot" anymore.  You're limiting yourself, and setting yourself up for some possible odd/weird problems if/when there's ever a problem with the boot drive. 's  "option 1" rocks.  In a nutshell, USE VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES instead of dual-boot. Which OS to use on the "bottom" depends on how far you want to push this. The "Hypervisor" for a VM platform can be REALLY small - lean and mean, with hardly ANYTHING other than the virtualization application (Xen, VMware, VirtualBox, whatever) installed on it. Then, you can run both Linux and Windows - at the SAME time - side by side - in separate Virtual Machine instances. You can run RedHat, Centos, Ubuntu, various versions of Windows... side-by-side at the same time.  (limited of course to your resources on the computer) If you're starting from "scratch" here's what I'd do. -> investigate the various virtualization solutions and choose one.  Wisely. -> investigate the various hypervisor options you have and choose one. Wisely. -> Install just enough OS to run the virtualization platform. -> setup Windows in a VM. -> setup Linux in a VM. -> use them both side-by-side.  Refrain from doing anything other than virtualization tasks on the hypervisor OS. If you already have a machine, that has a lot of extra RAM, you might just add VMware or similar, then setup VMs running whichever other operating systems you want to play with.  This is a kind of "lopsided" approach, but it works as well.

Paul Reiber at Quora Visit the source

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As already pointed out by Linux plays nice with your Master Boot Record (MBR) and if it detects other OSs, it will give you a choice of booting into different OSs. Windows, on the other hand, will make sure to overwrite the MBR and make itself the only choice. So, install Linux 2nd. Further, make sure that you have the harddisk partitioned to install Linux if you are going this way. There are 3 other options though : 1. Install linux in a virtual machine. You can download Virtual Box ( https://www.virtualbox.org/ ) and download the Linux ISO and install it within the virutal environment. It will not be as fast as it would be if natively installed. Also good if you are worried about warranties etc. 2. You may also check out the wubi installer from Ubuntu (http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/windows-installer) . It is supposed to install Linux like another app, though I have not tried this out. 3. You can install linux onto a usb stick (4GB sticks are recommended) and boot from it. The downside is that though it gives some persistence, it is not really good for long term use. It is quite good though if you want a short term solution for checking out some flavor of linux.

Vibhu Rishi

It is easier to install Linux as the second os. Most distributions will resize the Windows partition for you and then install. If you install Windows second, you'll have a lot of trouble as Windows tends to think it is the only os and wipes everything else. Your other option is Linux as the main os and run Windows in a VM. This has a number of advantages as you can then use both simultaneously if you want.

Paul Drake

I run several different distros, with and without GUI as VMs on Macs using VMware Fusion or Windows using VMware Player (Free). Set the networking to bridged to give the VM its own IP address. Also makes it easy to try different set-ups, different distros, run a prepared stack, back up the VM, etc. It's also easy to create set-ups from minimal installs that would match the steps you might take to set-up a VPS.

Daniel Woodard

In many cases installing linux in a windows system might actually affect your warranty of windows.. Any problems that come after installing linux in windows system could be solved easily due the huge support and forums.. Linux as far as I have heard creates more problems while booting when windows is installed secondary.. By my experience I know linux on windows system is much cool and makes system crashproof and secure.. Good luck.. There are lotta linux forums to help you out either way.. Virtual machines are just for trying and not work best when you expect some very serious work.. More cross platform and programs like 'wine' in linux help you run windows programs in linux.. Even ms office and games.. The final choice always lies with you as far as I am concerned..

Adithya Bharadwaj

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