I would like to play old games that still work on Windows XP. I would download the virtual machine from XP for free and switch it up on my laptop (with the Windows 10 operating system). Would it be possible? And when I have had enough of playing on Win XP, can I switch back to the original operating system Win 10 on my laptop? And are all files protected?
Theoretically yes, only a lot of games do not work as desired in a virtual environment. If possible I would add a second hard drive and install XP separately. (unfortunately not for all laptops)
You can forget about virtual operating systems, because the graphics acceleration is too bad for that and the graphics card can't be used either. If you then build an old retro PC or hack a second SSD / HDD into your current PC and install Windows XP there.
Actually you need this for the fewest games, since most of them also run on Windows 10 …
There's something called "dual boot". That means you can install multiple operating systems on one hard drive.
In your case Windows 10 and Windows XP.
You can find a lot on the web.
No, the games I played on Win XP didn't work on Windows 8 …
And if I switch between Win XP and 10, will the data always be saved and not be lost? Even if I should uninstall XP again?
And which would be which games?
Let it stay with the dual boot, Windows 10 and Windows XP like to bite.
For example, the PC Champion games (made for Win95 and 98) and the Dandelion games. They worked on XP.
And would XP make sense with Win 8? I still have my older laptop with Windows 8.
Does your laptop have a USB 3.0 or even 3.1 connection? Then I would recommend an external SSD / HDD and install your Windows XP there with Windows to Go.
They should actually run when installing and running in the corresponding 'compatibility mode' under Windows 8 / 8.1.
I'll try, thanks.
If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact me.
In principle, you can make two hard drives.
You can split your 500GB hard drive into 100GB and 400GB.
Then you can install XP on one and Windows 10 on the other.
If you uninstall Windows XP or format the hard drives "half" with Windows XP, you will not lose anything with the other.
VMWare did a pretty good job of delegating the graphics card to virtual machines. Biggest disadvantage: costs money. (It costs more than a physical gaming PC from the Windows XP era needed.)
There's also the option of setting up a USB stick as a boot stick so that its partitions are viewed as hard disks. Then you can build a dual-boot system in this way, in which the operating systems do not interfere with each other. Is called "Windows to go" or similar.
Example: https://www.easy2boot.com/add-payload-files/wintogo/
Oracle's VirtualBox can do the same. The problem: He has a laptop and certainly not the fastest, because with any virtualization software you quickly reach the limits of what is feasible and, above all, the limits of usability and speed.
However, VMWare puts a lot of manpower into the constant improvement of the use of physical hardware from virtual machines - probably much more than Oracle - and should therefore rather extend its lead. The freeware version of VirtualBox is further restricted for obvious reasons.
Well, I've always done better with VirtualBox, also in terms of performance, than with VMWare. But that's also a bit of a matter of opinion and what you prefer more. Oracle's focus is on hardware and software, and I myself helped there under the Linux distribution to further develop the VirtualBox.
Since I have been working with VMWare before VirtualBox even existed (since approx. 2002; VirtualBox was published according to Wikipedia 2007) and people generally find it difficult to change, I will stick with it.
However, I try out VirtualBox every now and then and am quite impressed with the further developments there.
Of course, that may explain why you know it better. I will soon take another look at VMWare, because there's a new version of ESXi that interests me, I always thought it was great.
