VirtualBox: Tom’s Budget Software Pick

Running operating systems other than OS X on an Intel Mac has been a reality for some time. You can use Apple’s Boot Camp to run Windows XP or Vista, or you can use a virtualization application, such as Parallels or Fusion, to run various OSes concurrently with OS X.

I prefer to use a virtualization application rather than Boot Camp, so I can switch back and forth between the different operating systems without rebooting. I can also share data between the OSes, something I can’t do with Boot Camp.

One virtualization application that doesn’t get a lot of press is VirtualBox, which is free for personal use. VirtualBox was originally created by Sun Microsystems and is now available as an open source project.

VirtualBox for the Mac has a feature set that keeps pace with commercial applications. It supports 64 bit-operating systems, and supports virtualizing the Mac’s hardware, so you can access most of the devices connected to your Mac, such as USB and network devices. VirtualBox uses OpenGL 3D for graphics acceleration, and supports a large number of guest OSes, including Windows XP and Vista, as well as various versions of Linux, BSD, and DOS.

VirtualBox’s only real shortcoming on the Mac is that it tends to be slightly technically oriented in its setup, something Parallels and Fusion hide from the end user. Nevertheless, the documentation is more than sufficient to help you get VirtualBox up and running on your Intel Mac. Once VirtualBox is running, I have found it to be stable and to operate quite well. Compared to commercial virtualization applications, VirtualBox tends to be slower in some respects, mostly those that involve using the Mac’s hardware, such as USB devices or a network. When it comes to running applications that are not graphics intensive, VirtualBox seems to be just as fast as its commercial competitors.

If you need to run a few Windows applications, or you want to have some fun with a Linux distribution, give VirtualBox a try.

VirtualBox is currently at version 2.1.0 and is available as a free download for personal use.

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