Maintenance release of VMware Workstation 7.1.1 officially supports server virtualization product ESXi 4.1. These updated versions enable us to run both latest products on Windows 7 computer without any physical servers. It’s a great chance for system and infrastructure administrator IT guys to experiment and play around with latest ESXi version on home or office PCs. This post shows how to install VMware ESXi 4.1 on VMware workstation 7.1.1 with Windows 7 host. Also this time you must download the management vSphere client 4.1 separately from internet to manage.  Read more...

Do you think no one can see your computer folders and files over network when its not shared? That is not the case. Any user with administrative access on your local computer or Domain ( if its connected) can access your whole C, D or other partitions without your knowledge and normal sharing. All partitions are shared for administrators in Windows Operating Systems which is called ‘ Administrative Shares’.  This post shows how to disable administrative shares in Windows 7 computer to keep your data secret.  Read more...

This post is a small comparison of  two free desktop virtualization software products Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 and Oracle VirtualBox 3.2. As I’m running a desktop virtualization blog and having enough of experience with these both products, I’m sharing this from my experience and thoughts. You can leave your comments and suggestions also. Let’s not forget that, ‘VMware Player’ also a free product which is not covered here. So, Virtual PC 2007 vs VirtualBox 3.2, which is the best one?

Before go into detailed comparison, the answer is; it depends on your requirements.  Read more...

This post is other part of Mac on Windows series in Sysprobs. The difference between other blogs and here is, I cover all installation steps clearly and post installation configurations including adjusting screen resolution, sound, networking and shared folders between Windows host and Mac OS X guest.  This guide shows how to install and update Snow Leopard 10.6.2 Intel AMD by Hazard to 10.6.4 on Virtual Box 3.2.8.

Any third party boot loaders not required for this methods but you have to download specific hackintosh installation ISO file. The original installation DVD or ISO file will not work here.  Read more...

This simple method shows how to clone virtual machine in virtual pc 2007 within a Minute. Do you know what’s the deal in it? Cloning option is not available in Virtual PC console. So the following trick will help to create multiple VMs in short time and less disk space.

We will use ‘differencing disk’ technology to clone virtual machines. This method is similar to ‘ Linked’ clone in VMware. Find out more information about VMware linked clone here.  Read more...

While I’m preparing a different post related to this topic, I noticed administrative shares not working in my Windows 7 workgroup computer. If the computer becomes part of domain, it started working for domain administrator, but in workgroup, no luck. After several tries and searches, this way helped me fix the issue.  Read more...

When ever you take a snapshot in VMware it keeps a separate VMDK file. Virtual machine will start running from that file and any changes after it will be keep on adding to snapshot file. Sometimes you have to merge these files to original base file or delete them. So, how to do it? Let me explain how to merge snapshots in VMware workstation 7.

I’m not going to show complicated commands and steps here, it is very simple, but you have to understand how it works.  Read more...

It’s always better to backup your data before do any re-installation or repair when Windows 7 crashed or can not be booted. How to do it when you can’t log in and see the explorer?. This small post shows how to use Puppy Linux bootable CD  to recover Windows 7 files.

I like Puppy Linux for this purpose, because;

1) Very Small file (130 MB only) compare to other Operating Systems.
2) Installation is not required, boot from CD or DVD and do your job.
3) Very quick booting.
4) Detects FAT32, NTFS partitions and external USB devices. So, transfer your data in easy way to removable disks.  Read more...