After 4 years since Virtual PC 2004 and 4 months since first public beta Microsoft finally release Virtual PC 2007, probably the last virtualization platform based on Connectix technology before the launch of brand new Windows Server Virtualization (codename Viridian).
This new version is released free of charge like Virtual Server 2005 and introduces some notable improvements like:
- 64bit host OS support
- AMD SVM and Intel VT support
- Vista support (both host and guest OS)
- PXE booting support
but continues to lack on some critical aspects like 64bit guest OSes support.
Anyway the biggest change in this release is dropping of support for Windows 95 (while support for OS/2 Warp is still there).
This may seem a contraddiction: one of the first purposes of virtualization was supporting legacy applications and environments, and Microsoft more than anybody else on the IT industry could benefit from it to grant extended support to its customers. Instead it’s the market leader and competitor VMware which provides such support.
Download Virtual PC 2007 here (both 32 and 64bit).
The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.