AS THE FURORE over Vista's failings and the cries for Microsoft to continue to sup¬port XP has shown, it matters what operating system (OS) you run. So~e people like to keep their options open, however, by maintaining multiple PCs.

But it's not jusf a matter of wanting to enjoy a variety of computing experiences that may lead you to experiment with a different OS, it's what that OS can do, how it behaves and the software it can run.

Perhaps you've just upgraded to Vista and found that some of your older software is no longer supported: Or maybe you've discovered an exciting new software package, only to find that it runs under Linux.

These are just two instances where you might want to run more than one OS, but you needn't buy two machines or set up a dual-boot to achieve this. Virtualisation is a much easier approach and, over the following pages, we'll show you how to use it. Such software creates a 'virtual' machine - a software emulation of a real Pc. A virtual machine behaves exactly like a physical one, and you can install any OS you like on it. The only catch is that it must run on a Pc.

Running a guest OS that's identical to the host OS might not seem particularly useful, but this technique adds security for those who use the same machine for both business and pleasure. For example, a virus, failed installation or corruption on the guest OS can't interfere with the host OS.

We'll be using two virtualisation packages- Microsoft Virtual PC to run a second OS for which you have the disc (an older version of Windows, for example), and VMware Player to run a pre-prepared virtual machine of a free OS such as Linux.

Good suggestion. I'll have to jump into things with virtual machines on my desktop and maybe multiple monitors. Most of my work is far more effective from a linux platform however sometimes I need windows for testing. Unfortunately though when it comes to audio and video related work I'm unable to find mature enough software to do the job in linux at this time and am hard pressed to find linux device drivers for my audio and video hardware.

As the article suggests about viruses only affecting the virtual machine being a security plus - keep that in mind even if you're just an average user but you use your laptop on unsecured wireless networks or you use your laptop at a coffee shop.

Phil