Windows emulation on linux

Windows emulation on linux

I wanted to install a Linux system with Windows emulation for the software she needs on Windows. I quickly stopped this path as I had to setup either Xen or VMware and spend days/weeks (since I'm no expert with all that stuff).

I had a very easy time setting up Windows emulation with qemu in fedora.

Do it like this:

rpm -Uvh http://fedoranews.org/tchung/qemu/0.8.1/fc5/2.6.17-1.2174_FC5/qemu-0.8.1-2.fc5.i386.rpm
rpm -Uvh http://fedoranews.org/tchung/qemu/0.8.1/fc5/2.6.17-1.2174_FC5/\ kmod-kqemu-1.3.0pre7-2.fc5.2.6.17_1.2174_FC5.i386.rpm
qemu-img create -f qcow windows.img 10000M # for a 10 GB virtual disk
# insert windows installation CD into CD-ROM drive
qemu windows.img -localtime -k en-us -monitor stdio -usb -usbdevice tablet \ -soundhw es1370 -cdrom /dev/cdrom -boot d -m 512 # for 512MB simulated RAM

That will boot the emulated system from the windows installation CD. After you install windows, the system will reboot. Finish the installation, shut down the emulated windows the way you normally shut down windows, and close qemu. After that, you can boot the emulated system from the hard drive instead of the CD, as follows:

qemu windows.img -localtime -k en-us -monitor stdio -usb -usbdevice tablet -soundhw es1370 -cdrom /dev/cdrom -kernel-kqemu -m 512

The -kernel-kqemu switch makes windows run a lot faster (but you can't use it while installing windows -- windows will hang). Once everything is set up correctly, you should be able to run qemu full screen (Ctrl-Alt-f) and not even notice the emulation overhead.

Hope this helps.