Run Old Windows Apps in Vista... Finally!

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hellwig

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You have to have a licensed copy of the OS you install in VirtualPC, so that's probably not going to work for a lot of people. Second, peripheral support within virtualPC is practically null, you can't run any 3D applications because the virtual Image can't see your graphics card.

How many applications don't run under Vista? I have XP Pro x64 (based on Windows Server 2003), and I haven't found too many programs that don't run on it (there were some Explorer compatability issues, but most prorams still ran). Also, why would this program be too late? Did Microsoft include XP/2000 application support under Windows 7? I would think that if Vista didn't support these apps, neither will Windows 7. Since 7 is based on Vista, I have to think this app is just as relevant (if not more so) now than before. If Microsoft doesn't want to blow it with 7, they needed to release this program when they did, to show they can support those old apps.
 

techguy911

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This already exists its called vmware install xp,win98-95,linux and run your apps without partitioning your hd.

And it works its not a beta product ms is waaay behind in this technology.

 

Guimar

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Most of the APS I had problems with worked fine If I right clicked on the and told Vista to run them as XP apps.
It would be much more exciting If it supported XP printer drivers.
HP decided not to release a driver for my plotter, so I have to keep an XP machine just to run the unit.
 

techguy911

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peripheral support within virtualPC is practically null, you can't run any 3D applications because the virtual Image can't see your graphics card.

Maybe with ms solution but vmware i can run dx9 games on vista 64 with 32bit xp pro full dx9 support in games.

 
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Perhaps it is in a testing phase on Vista.
We know Ms products always are buggy on first release. Perhaps they can straighten out some bugs, gain some programming experience, so that maybe 6 months to 2 years from now a similar product can be created for Win 7.

It'd be even nicer if I can fully run my old DOS, Win3.x and Win9.x games and tools on it!
(And XP too of course).

I have no problem with MS creating additional software, though prefer it to be in a plus pack; not in the oem versions.
Not everyone needs this.
Besides, if Win7 is an extension of Vista, who says the 'Virtual Desktop' won't run on Win7 (perhaps after an update)?
 

tntom

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I wonder if it is an emulator or virtual enviroment? Because that effects the performance.
Why don't they just use WINE? it works for Linux. I have several games that will not run under WinXP at all! that were made for Win98 but they run natively without virtualization under Linux using WINE. Try playing "Legacy of Time 4" under WinXP it won't run.
 

apache_lives

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ummmmm from my upgrade from XP to Vista i found that all of my apps worked 100% in vista, BS incompatible!

If your using software and devices that are incompatible with vista then dont buy that brand of device (HP LOL) again, and for software, buy the LEGIT copy so your entitled for upgrades/support etc. Software companies not supporting Vista etc WILL NOT SURVIVE.

As for ancient games, DosBox works fine, and i have an old rig that has a 3Dfx Voodoo2 (SLI!!) for those games etc
 
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There have been issues with Win9x applications to XP, and a number of win9x applications, that have not been upgraded to run on XP (but do run on it), won't run on Vista.

As far as I see it, applications do just fine not supporting Vista.
Vista is a bug that came in and goes out as fast as it came; being the underdog of XP and Win7.
Though I have my doubts Win7 will be such a great improvement over XP, save some newer drivers and DX10.
 

Cuddles

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Sounds promising. Problem with Virtual PC is that you need the Win 9X, 3.1, and/or XP plus there is still those few applications that look for that 3D Card. Not to big of a problem for somebody like me who has owned a computer since 95 and has all the OS's but could be a big problem for others. Still, some of the older games don't run well on Vista (Max Payne, Resident Evil, Fallout, etc) while games like Freespace 2 don't run at all and do a 3D Card check... So I'm sure there is other applications that are vital to others that are not games that are not compatiable with Vista just I have a huge game collection and those are the ones I know.
I went a little overboard and rebuilt a legacy computer to run the older games but I'm sure not everyone can do that.
Vista works and works well for me. I don't even remember the last time I had to restart but then again all of my equipment was new when Vista came out. My older computer works fine with XP so I'm happy with both of them. I won't get into Linux because that was just a bad experience.
 

fancarolina

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My question about MED-V is why does Microsoft only offically support their 32-bit versions of Vista? I would think this would have more applications in a 64-bit environment.
 
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Right now I'm on a multiboot laptop that runs Ubuntu, XP, and Win7. Win7 is definitely the fastest for pretty much everything. I had Vista on here for a while but its just too slow. Its kind of funny that the beta is much better than vista already. Hopefully this MED-V transfers over to Win7. UAC and the new security policies can cause a lot of problems for older apps. I work tech support and it has caused me so many headaches. Our software devs are the problem for the most part, but it would be nice for Mic to help us out some.
 

captaincharisma

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this is only going to be good for the very few businesses that actually switch to vista (god only knows how many) so they can still run there old custom software like banks do. heck some businesses still use old windows 95 apps because they need the software and no one will update the software
 

megamanx00

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Better late than never, but certainly too late for too many people to care. This strikes me as just dumb by Microsoft since they have spent an incredible amount of man hours patching Vista to run older applications by emulating the bad API habits of XP when they could have just done this in the first place. Personally I just dual boot XP and Vista for now and it works out fine for me as it does for many.

Even though many of you mention virtualization you forget that businesses need to buy a valid copy of XP to virtualize, which is a big expense if you have a lot of machines that need to run a specific Vista incompatible program. It's not like I don't virtualize windows ME myself to run a few old programs myself :eek:
 

brukster

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All the virtual desktops run somewhere else on a server and only a connection client is on my machine from the sound of it.
 
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Quoting hellwig:

"How many applications don't run under Vista?"
When Vista decided to adopt that "only limited compatibility" policy I was amazed. The quality of some software around was - and still is - sometimes terrible (such as hardcoding the HOME path instead of polling it at runtime thuru the provided APIs, require write access to privileged system-wide resources, lack of proper per-user support). I saw finally some will to improve. Unlucly, I overlooked a few things.

I've found only a single app which is not Vista(64)-Compatible. Too bad it's also the most important one on my workflow.
I've found out that it seems to work ok with limited functionality with admin privileges, but you understand that this solution is far from elegant (and still I am unable to start it more than 4 times each day for some strange reasons).

As I am not planning to switch to Win7, this is a real Good Thing to me. And as a last thing, I think Vista is just fine.
 

apache_lives

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[citation][nom]ProDigit80[/nom]There have been issues with Win9x applications to XP, and a number of win9x applications, that have not been upgraded to run on XP (but do run on it), won't run on Vista.As far as I see it, applications do just fine not supporting Vista.Vista is a bug that came in and goes out as fast as it came; being the underdog of XP and Win7.Though I have my doubts Win7 will be such a great improvement over XP, save some newer drivers and DX10.[/citation]

Heh another moron living under a rock thats never tried vista and doesnt realise how nice it actually is, provided you use proper hardware and not some old 7th generation rubbish (pentium 4, athlon xp etc). WTF bugs and issues are we talking about?
 

WheelsOfConfusion

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[citation][nom]tntom[/nom]Why don't they just use WINE? it works for Linux.[/citation]
Because Windows is not Linux. WINE is for Unix-like systems, it translates Windows API calls into something *nix can understand.

The latest versions of WINE are also LGPL'd (used to also have an MIT license, which is why Cedega forked from older WINE as a base into a proprietary application), so if Microsoft adapted WINE itself to turn old Windows API calls into something New Windows could understand, it would have to make the source code available with the product. Microsoft still doesn't like open source solutions if it doesn't have to use them.
 
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