Virtual machine Win 7
 

There's some info about Windows 7 allowing to run Windows XP as a virtual machine. I have Win 7 Home Premium. Can I run Win 98 virtually on my Win 7?

No, 7 professional and above. Unless you want to go this route...
Create an XP Mode for Windows 7 Home Versions & Vista - How-To Geek

OK, I'll ask...

What's a virtual machine?




Nevermind... I just searched and now know that I'll never understand what a VM is.

Computers today have so much horsepower that you can run multiple operating systems at the same time. There are various software solutions to make this happen. When I used to teach, our students would have 2 servers (the operating systems) and a client OS, all running on a single physical computer. As long as the computer has enough CPU and memory, it works great.

If you want to run Win 98 virtually on Win 7 then try Sun VirtualBox - it's free.

Anti Virus?
 

I read a review on this after your suggestion. It sounds like it would be a good system to try. The review recommended keeping the virtual OS protected with up to date antivirus software. I'm already running Norton Internet Security on the host Win7 machine; do I really need to run another on the virtual?

Yep, if the other OS is on the network, it is its own entity, and the AV on the other won't do anything for it. You could perhaps just having it scanning the virtual drive, but that doesn't do anything in real time.

My real reason for wanting to do this is to have access to all the stuff on my old machine. I upgraded from Win98 to Win7 (yea, it was quite a leap). I saved all the stuff I could, but some stuff wasn't transferable; so I'm thinking I could run a virtual Win98 on my Win7 and still have access to all my old stuff. So, the question now is, can I run Wim98 without any connection to the outside world and eliminate the need for AV software?

What kind of stuff are you trying to save? Other options might work better than a VM of an old OS.

Or, at least have some sort of plan of how you'll move stuff over time to newer stuff that will run on 7, so you're not stuck on 98 for all time.

I've made the switch quite nicely actually and am enjoying the new machine; we've had it now since spring. The old machine is gathering dust, however my electronic address book (Palm Zire) died the other day (batteries I suspect), so the back up info is all on my old machine; that's all that I really want. The other more prevalent reason for doing this is to gain the knowledge of just doing it. I'll learn about VMs this way.