Virtualization options

Although there are a plethora of virtualization options, there are really only two that I've used extensively.  VMware is the original virtualization platform and probably the one that most people know about.  To be clear, I've used many versions of VMware and even purchased a commercial license to use as a developer.  But most recently, I needed to set up a Windows Server 2008 VM for testing, and the Virtual PC stuff that comes Windows 7 doesn't do 64-bit, so I tried VMware.  After fighting with it for the better part of a day, I gave up.  I got cryptic messages about having to install drivers, I got errors saying that files that were needed for the installation weren't available.  It just plain didn't work.

So I installed Virtualbox.  I have used Virtualbox for a few years now when I needed a free virtualization option, and I've recommended it to a few friends and family.  It's always worked well for me, although to be fair my needs have never been extreme.  I was quite surprised to find that it installed the Windows Server 2008 VM on the first try with no hassles whatsoever.

I read somewhere that VMware was supposed to be faster than Virtualbox, but based on the experience I've had to today, Virtualbox works a million times better than VMware, and I'll take that over a bit of speed any day.