Binary Fortress Software

Not a day goes by where I don’t use a virtual machine at least once. In fact, it’s quite common that I have more than 1 virtual machine running all time. Virtual machines provide the perfect way to test out software without mucking up my main computer. I use VMs to test things like software I write in different operating systems, web pages I’m working on in different browsers and various less-than-trusted applications. It’s the perfect test environment, because if anything gets messed up I can either revert to a snapshot or just do a fresh install of the operating system. For years I have loved VMware Workstation, and their new v6.0 is absolutely incredible. It’s fast and reliable but unfortunately it’s far from free. With a nearly $200 price tag this is 1 piece of software I just can’t afford to use at home. So, I have been forced to use VirtualPC at home. VirtualPC was purchased by Microsoft a few years ago and hasn’t really been able to keep up with VMware. It’s noticeably slower, provides far less bells and whistles, and doesn’t even support proper snapshots.

Enter VirtualBox. It’s just as fast as VMware, support snapshots, audio, host interface networking… etc. Oh, and it’s free. Ever since I discovered this Gem I have ditched VirtualPC (thank god) and have re-created all my VMs in VirtualBox. Everything has been running like a champ and I can’t believe I didn’t hear about this quality piece of software sooner.

VirtualBox provides all the functionality of VMware Workstation, plus all the speed, but without the hefty price tag. Kudos to Innotek for creating this amazing software!